The International Human Rights Network (IHRN) is a not-for-profit company established in the Republic of Ireland. IHRN provides support to others seeking to develop human rights-based approaches in their work. This support includes a range of technical assistance; training, project needs assessment, design and evaluation, organisational reviews, research and analysis and other capacity-building support. Partners include states, inter-governmental organizations and agencies, regional organisations, civil society organisations, and private sector actors.

IHRN activities include own-initiative projects; advocacy; lessons learning through a range of participatory activities, including training, research and consultation; and pro-bono support to other not-for-profit organisations which share the Network’s core principles. IHRN is a leading specialist in human rights-based approaches with extensive experience providing a range of capacity building support, including design and delivery of training (including training of trainers) evaluations, advice, and programme management. IHRN undertakes contract assignments for a range of actors including, bi-lateral donors, UN agencies, the Council of Europe, the European Commission (including as was Quality Assurance Manager to the Governance~20 Consortium for EC Framework Contract Lot 7 (Governance & Home Affairs) during 2009-13.

The Network is the successor to The International Human Rights Trust established as a charity in 1995 by Karen Kenny and Brian McKeown. The work of IHRT was carried out under the guidance of a Board of Trustees with Noeline Blackwell (Chair), David Begg, Brian McKeown, Grahame Morphey, with Harry McKeon served as Honorary Treasurer. The principles developed through the Trust’s work are the foundation of those which the Network continues to develop and advocate.

Brian McKeown served as co-founder and Trustee of the International Human Rights Trust and as an independent advisor until his retirement in 2003. He had previously served as Director of Trócaire, the Irish international development agency for twenty-one years. During this period he worked on development issues in Asia, Africa and South America. He was President of the European Union Development NGOs Liaison Committee, a member of the (then) Irish Government’s Advisory Council on Development as well as Chair of the Confederation of Irish Development Organisations. He was a founder and Trustee of the Association of West European Parliamentarians for Southern Africa (AWEPA)- African European Institute. In 1995 he was appointed the European Union’s Co-ordinator for the UN Human Rights Operation in Rwanda (HRFOR).

Karen Kenny was co-founder of the International Human Rights Trust. Previously  she was a UN human rights adviser in peacekeeping contexts, as well as serving the Security Council’s Commission of Experts as a war crimes investigator in El Salvador, former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. She decided against renewing her Rwanda UN contract as investigation team leader in 1994 having concluded that the then UN approach was and ineffective and inadequately resourced to carry out its mandate in the aftermath of the Rwandan genocide.  She was also advisor to the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), the European Commission and individual governments regarding human rights-based approaches and an expert member of the Standing Committee on Human Rights, in the Irish Government’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, between 1997 and 2014. She was a founding member of Trinity College Dublin Free Legal Aid Centre.