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Confrence “What Justice for Syria and ISIS?”
March 9, 2017
The Faculty of Law welcomes His Excellency Christian Wenaweser for the 2017 Proulx Roundtable Conference.
Syria has become the biggest humanitarian crisis of our time. Millions of refugees have fled the war, and tens of thousands have become victims of crimes against humanity committed by the Syrian Government. The so-called “Islamic State” has also committed genocide and other crimes against minority groups such as the Yazidi Kurds in neighbouring Iraq. Yet despite widespread outrage at these atrocities, the international community has done little to hold the perpetrators accountable.
The search for justice in Syria has been elusive, but it remains a vital ingredient of a sustainable peace in the region. Given the political constraints within the UN, what justice can we realistically achieve for the people of Syria?
Keynote speaker:
Ambassador Christian Wenaweser, Representative of Liechtenstein to the United Nations and former President of the International Criminal Court Assembly of States Parties, will discuss the UN’s new International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism to investigate these atrocities, and other initiatives for justice in Syria.
He will be joined by a roundtable consisting of:
- Betsy Apple: Advocacy Director for the Open Society Justice Initiative
- Fannie Lafontaine: Professor of Human Rights law at Laval University
- Sarwat Bashi: McGill O’Brien Fellow and Syrian human rights activist
- Barzan Barzani: McGill Post-Doctoral Fellow and Iraqi Kurdish human rights activist
With Introductory remarks by former UN prosecutor Professor Payam Akhavan and former Minister of Justice and Attorney-General of Canada Professor Irwin Cotler.
