Baroness Caroline Cox

As well as being the Chief Executive of HART (Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust) Lady Cox was Founder Chancellor of Bournemouth University, 1991-2001 and is now Chancellor of Liverpool Hope University and Vice President of the Royal College of Nursing. Additionally she was a non-executive director of the Siberian Medical University and a founder Trustee of MERLIN (Medical Emergency Relief International).

Lady Cox serves as a non-executive director of the Andrei Sakharov Foundation and is the Chairman of the Executive Board of the International Islamic Christian Organisation for Reconciliation and Reconstruction (IICORR), a charity which she helped to set up to promote stronger relationships between Muslims and Christians.

Baroness Cox is the chairperson of the British Armenia All-Party Parliamentary Group and the vice chairperson of the UK North Korea All-Party Parliamentary Group.

In recognition of her work in the international humanitarian and human rights arenas over the past twenty years, she had been awarded the Commander Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland; the prestigious Wilberforce Award; the International Mother Teresa Award from the All India Christian Council; the Mkhitar Gosh Medal conferred by the President of the Republic of Armenia; and the anniversary medal presented by Lech Walesa, the former President of Poland, at the 25th anniversary of the Polish Solidarity Movement.

Lady Cox has also been awarded an Honorary Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons of England and Honorary Doctorates by universities in the United Kingdom, the United States of America, the Russian Federation and Armenia.

Baroness Cox has supported disability causes for many years, is an active member of the World Committee on Disability and a judge for the Franklin Delano Roosevelt International Disability Award, which is distributed annually at the United Nations in New York to a nation that has met the goals of the UN World Programme of Action Concerning disabled persons.

Baroness Cox's humanitarian aid work has taken her on many missions to conflict zones, allowing her to obtain first hand evidence of the human rights violations and humanitarian needs. Areas travelled include the Armenian enclave of Nagorno Karabakh; Sudan; Nigeria; Uganda; the Karen; Karenni; Shan and Chin peoples in the jungles of Burma; and communities suffering from conflict in Indonesia. She has also visited North Korea helping to promote Parliamentary initiatives and medical programmes. Additionally Caroline has been instrumental in helping to change the former Soviet Union policies for orphaned and abandoned children from institutional to foster family care.