Jan Fiala, legal officer with the Mental Disability Advocacy Center in Budapest, Hungary, will present a lecture Monday, Dec. 11, entitled Human Rights and Mental Disability in Post-Communist Europe, a part of the UALR Department of Psychology’ Marie Wilson Howell Lecture Series.

Admission is free for the 7:45 p.m. lecture at Dickinson Auditorium. The Mental Disability Advocacy Center is an international non-governmental organization based in Budapest that promotes and protects the human rights of people with mental health problems and intellectual disabilities across central and eastern Europe and central Asia. MDAC works to improve the quality of life for people with mental disabilities through litigation, research, and international advocacy. MDAC has participatory status at the Council of Europe and is a cooperating organization of the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights.

The speaking engagement at UALR is being supported, in part, by the Center for International Rehabilitation Research and Information Exchange (CIRRIE) at the University of Buffalo, SUNY, in conjunction with the 2006 Mary E. Switzer Distinguished Fellowship in Rehabilitation Research from the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, U.S. Department of Education, held by UALR Psychology professor, Daniel Holland.