Dennis van der Veur is the head of the sector "Equality" at the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights. His areas of expertise include equality, LGBT, hate crime, civil society and networking. Previously he was adviser to the Council of Europe's Commissioner for Human Rights, and Monitoring Officer at the OSCE Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR). He is the author of several articles including 'Homosexuality in South Eastern Europe', HIVOS/COC Netherlands, 2003 and 'EU Enlargement: a gay perspective - Report on the position of lesbian women and gay men in EU accession countries' (ed.), Anne Vondeling Stichting, 2001.He also co-authored an article on 'Hate crimes against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons and the policy response of international governmental organisations, Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights, vol. 27 no. 4 (December 2009).He has postgraduate degrees in educational sciences from the University of Amsterdam and in human rights/democratization from the European Inter University Centre, Venice, Italy.