Youth and the Internet: Fighting Radicalization and Extremism

Mr. Herminio Harry L. Roque Jr. is the Chairperson of Center for International Law (Centerlaw) since 2010 and is one the easily recognizable public intellectuals in the Philippines.  He is an Associate Professor at the UP College of Law where he is also the Director of the University's Center Institute of International Legal Studies.  His professional and academic interests are wide-ranging, embracing such diverse areas as criminal law, constitutional law, international law, international human rights law and international humanitarian law. Very recently, he spoke at a panel on the South China Sea conflict at the Harvard Law School organized by the Harvard Journal of International Law.

Professor Roque is admitted to practice before the International Criminal Court, the first Asian to do so, and the UN War Crimes Tribunal for Rwanda. He is also elected to the Governing Council of the Asian Society of International Law and the International Criminal Bar. 

He is the lead counsel in a number of public interest cases. Among these are Vinuya v. Executive Secretary where he represented surviving victims of mass rape, commonly referred to as “comfort women,” the Adonis case before the UNHRC questioning the Philippines’  criminal libel law, a direct challenge to the constitutionality of the libel law in the Philippines in the Cybercrime Prevention Act case, and in Ninez Cacho- Olivarez, et al v. Juan Miguel Arroyo, a class action suit in behalf of journalists against the First Gentleman’s indiscriminate filing of libel cases to harass journalists and to muzzle freedom of the press. He also represents 15 heirs of the victims of the Ampatuan Massacre in the multiple murder cases being tried before the Quezon City Regional Trial Court. He holds degrees in Bachelor of Arts in Economics and Political Science (University of Michigan, with honors), Bachelor of Laws (University of the Philippines College of Law) and a Master of Laws (London School of Economics, with merit).