Search:

Intersessional Meeting of Crimes Against Humanity Initiative held at Grotius Centre, The Hague

On 11 and 12 June, leading experts in the area of international criminal justice convened for an Intersessional Meeting in The Hague to discuss the prospects of a multilateral convention on Crimes against Humanity.

The meeting was the second expert meeting held under the auspices of the Washington University School of Law, Whitney R. Harris World Law Institute’s Crimes Against Humanity Initiative. It was held at the Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies (Leiden University, Campus Den Haag) and opened by Jozias Van Aartsen, Mayor of the City of The Hague.

Background

Since World War II, major categories of crimes, such as genocide and war crimes have been codified in multilateral treaties. The Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court contains a codification of crimes against humanity. However, there is no separate multilateral legal document on the prevention and punishment of crimes against humanity, although this category of crime has received significant attention in jurisprudence and practice of criminal tribunals since Nuremberg and Tokyo.

The Crimes Against Humanity Initiative is intended to fill this historic gap. It builds upon the extraordinary achievements reached during the negotiations of the Statute of the International Criminal Court and judicial practice in criminal matters. At the Intersessional Meeting at The Hague, the Steering Committee invited comments and observations of experts and practitioners of Hague institutions and NGOs active in the field (Coalition for the International Criminal Court, Amnesty International, Africa Legal Aid). The Meeting discussed key elements of a proposed regulatory instrument on crimes against humanity, ranging from definitional questions and issues of cooperation and judicial assistance to the link of the concept to the doctrine of ‘Responsibility to Protect’.

The input from The Hague community will provide guidance for a further refinement of elements and ideas, which are meant to be presented as an ‘academic offering’ to the international community.

The steering committee of the project consists of eminent experts in the field, including Leila Sadat, Chair, Professor and Director of the Whitney R. Harris World Law Institute at the Washington University School of Law in St. Louis; M. Cherif Bassiouni, Professor and President of the International Human Rights Law Institute at DePaul University College of Law in Chicago; Hans Corell, former United Nations Under-Secretary for Legal Affairs; Richard Goldstone, former Justice of the South African Constitutional Court and former Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and for the Former Yugoslavia; Juan Méndez, President of the International Center for Transitional Justice and former president of the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights; William Schabas, Professor and Director of the Irish Centre for Human Rights of the National University of Ireland at Galway; and Christine Van Den Wyngaert, Judge at the International Criminal Court.

Organisers

The initiative is a project of the Whitney R. Harris World Law Institute at the Washington University School of Law,and The United States Institute of Peace. It was locally supported by the Grotius Centre for International Legal Studies - Leiden University, the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences and the City of The Hague.

The two-year Crimes Against Humanity Initiative is being funded by a gift from Washington University in St. Louis alumnus Steven Cash Nickerson, and the United States Institute of Peace.

More information

For more information see the website of the Washington University School of Law, Whitney R. Harris World Law Institute. For any further queries, please contact Prof. B. Don Taylor III, (314) 935-4704, bdtaylor@wulaw.wustl.edu.