Theodor Meron

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Theodor Meron bigraphy, stories - Lawyers

Theodor Meron : biography

28 April 1930 –

Theodor Meron (born 28 April 1930) is the President of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and Presiding Judge of the Appeals Chambers of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and the ICTY,See http://www.icty.org/sid/10856/en having been elected on October 19, 2011 as President of the ICTY, starting November 17, 2011.See http://www.icty.org/sid/10827 He previously served as President of the ICTY from 2003 to 2005.See http://www.icty.org/sid/149 On December 20, 2011, Meron was elected as a Judge of the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (Mechanism).See http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2011/ga11199.doc.htm On February 29, 2012, he was appointed President of the Mechanism for a four-year term, starting March 1, 2012.See http://www.un.org/News/Press/docs/2012/sga1327.doc.htm He also serves as Honorary President of the American Society of International Law.See http://www.law.nyu.edu/news/MERON_ASIL_HONORARY

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda Appeals Chamber President

Rwanda has formally called for the resignation of embattled president of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda Appeals Chamber Theodor Meron, who was recently accused of influencing court decisions by exerting undue influence on judges to let high-profile war crimes suspects go free. Executive Secretary of the National Commission for the Fight against Genocide (CNLG), Jean de Dieu Mucyo,has stated permitting these decisions could have "disastrous consequences for the current and future cases of international war crimes, for truth and justice in the world, for peace and tolerance, and for human rights and freedoms." , By By Edwin Musoni, AllAfrica June 19,2013

Meron and other judges reversed convictions and reduced considerably the sentences of Col. Theoneste Bagosora,the mastermind of the 1994 Hutu Genocide against the Tutsi, resulting in 800,000 to 1 million deaths, from life to 35 years – and second in command Lt. Col. Anatole Nsengiyumva from life to time served of 15 years. He was released June 2013

Meron is also accused of leading acquittals of Hutus Protais Zigiranyirazo in November 2009 and, recently, Justin Mugenzi and Prosper Mugiraneza, all senior officials of the genocidal regime.

List of people indicted in the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, convictions and current status in the court.

Works

Meron’s books include: Investment Insurance in International Law (Oceana-Sijthoff, 1976); The United Nations Secretariat (Lexington Books, 1977); Human Rights in International Law (Oxford University Press, 1984); Human Rights Law-Making in the United Nations (Oxford University Press, 1986) (awarded the certificate of merit of the American Society of International Law); Human Rights in Internal Strife: Their International Protection (Sir Hersch Lauterpacht Memorial Lectures, Grotius Publications, 1987); Human Rights and Humanitarian Norms as Customary Law (Oxford University Press, 1989); Henry’s Wars and Shakespeare’s Laws (Oxford University Press, 1993); Bloody Constraint: War and Chivalry in Shakespeare (Oxford University Press, 1998); War Crimes Law Comes of Age: Essays (Oxford University Press, 1998), International Law In the Age of Human Rights (Martinus Nijhoff, 2004), and The Humanization of International Law (Hague Academy of International Law and Nijhoff, 2006).http://www.acls.org/programs/Default.aspx?id=3434 His latest book, a selection of his speeches entitled The Making of International Justice: A View from the Bench, appeared in 2011 (Oxford University Press).http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/product/9780199608935.do

Legal opinion on settlements in the occupied territories

In the late 1960s, Meron was legal counsel to the Israeli Foreign Ministry and wrote a secret 1967 memo "God’s Warriors, CNN Presents, produced by Christiane Amanpour, first aired August 21, 2007. Interview with Meron. School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. Links to 1967 Meron opinion in English and Hebrew. is also here in Hebrew for Prime Minister Levi Eshkol, who was considering creating an Israeli settlement at Kfar Etzion. This was just after Israel’s victory in the Six-Day War of June 1967. Meron’s memo concluded that creating new settlements in the Occupied Territories would be a violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention. Eshkol went ahead to create the settlement anyway, and therefore set the conditions which began the Movement for Greater Israel and Israel’s settlement enterprise.