Praveena Nair, a graduate of Kerala Law Academy College and the National Law Academy of India University, Bangalore, India, began a three-month internship at the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in The Hague in January. She tells us that it was her first ever internship abroad. She performed a variety of tasks ranging from assisting in the preparation of drafts, summaries and briefs to updating and reviewing documents for the Tribunal database. She also attended cases being heard at the International Criminal Court and the International Criminal tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and the Legacy Conference for the ICTY which discussed how the ICTY legacy could be carried forward. On her return to Bangalore Praveena intends to explain to students there how internships at international criminal tribunals would lead to a greater understanding of the role of such tribunals.

Judy Mionki, a graduate of the United States International University, Nairobi, Kenya, monitored the trial of Charles Taylor at the Special Court for Sierra Leone (in the International Criminal Court in The Hague) from January 2010. She was responsible for daily in-court monitoring and writing substantive monthly reports on legal developments, testimony, evidentiary issues, and motions and Trial Chamber and Appeals Chamber decisions. She also researched and wrote thematic reports on legal issues arising during trial. She tells us that her time at the Special Court heightened her awareness of gender-based war crimes so that, when the crisis in Kenya in December 2007 was referred to the International Criminal Court, she contacted an NGO in Kenya to ensure that women affected by gender-based violence were adequately represented.

Xintong Wang, who originally came from a tiny town in rural China and funded herself through university in Beijing by winning a TV general knowledge quiz, tells us that, when she arrived at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and was assigned to Trial Chamber I, on her second day she was asked to assist in drafting a judicial decision. With the help of the Trial Chamber judges and her supervisors she rose to the challenge and is proud to think that she contributed to the development of international criminal law. Since then, she has taken an active part in the functioning of the Trial Chamber by drafting, summarizing witness testimonies and preparing other legal documents. Her original term of three months’ internship was extended for another two months. While at the Tribunal she passed a written examination to become a legal officer in a Beijing court.

Ciaodan Cao studied law at the North University of China. While still a student she was involved in a campaign to inform women in rural areas about their rights under marriage law and family law. Later on, while working for a Chinese company, she promoted employment rights in the company particularly those relating to women. After that she studied for a postgraduate degree in Human Rights Law at Lund University. Now that she is interning at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, her responsibilities include assisting the Judges and Senior Legal Officers, carrying out research, drafting decisions, witness summaries and judgments, and participating in the analysis and discussion of proceedings. She tells us that her work at the Tribunal has deepened her understanding of international criminal and humanitarian law and developed her research skills.

The first, in February 2009, the Trust was to Song Qiang, a graduate of Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, China. On her return to Guangzhou from the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, she told us of her plans to widen awareness of international criminal law in China. She would encourage others to take up internships at international criminal tribunals by telling them how much she had learned through her own experiences as an intern. In particular, she would like to describe her time at the Yugoslav Tribunal to students of international law and international criminal law at Sun Yat-Sen University. She was planning with some of her fellow-students to discuss issues of international humanitarian law perhaps through taking part in moots (mock trials). After her return to Guangzhou she began to work for a law firm specialising in company law but hopes to return to international law before long.

Prince Neto D.C.B.Waite from Jamaica, a graduate of the Norman Manley Law School, University of the West Indies and Harvard Law School, was an intern at the International Criminal Court in The Hague from June to December 2009. He was a member of a small and diverse team of judges, legal officers and other interns and undertook research and analysis in the areas of public international law, international human rights law, international criminal law, international humanitarian law as well as comparative research concerning criminal procedural practice in common law and non-common law systems; in addition, he drafted legal memoranda and contributed to the drafting of decisions and orders for the use of the Appeals Chamber of the Court. Since then he has had an article, ‘An Inquiry into the ICC Appeals Chamber Exercise of the Power of Remand’, published in a leading international law journal. In August 2010 he will be taking up a lectureship in international law and is looking forward to sharing his experiences at the ICC with his students.

Xiaodan Song, a graduate from Wuhan University, was an intern at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia from October 2009 to February 2010. Her interest in international humanitarian law began when she was a student and saw the film Hotel Rwanda with its depiction of genocide which sparked her general interest in the subject, in particular in Sudan and the role of transnational corporations in that country.

Watna Mori, from Papua New Guinea, was an intern at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia from July to December 2009. She told us in her application to the Trust that she studied law because she wanted to address injustice, especially in her own country where, although the concept of human rights is gaining understanding among ordinary Papua New Guineans, progress is slow. Her long-term goal is to return to her country to establish a legal aid/community legal system, similar to that set up in Indonesia, as an alternative to village courts which rely on money or compensation. Such a system would address issues such as corruption, repression of political participation and violence against women. Watna was an intern in Trial Chamber III during the case of Prosecutor v. Mico Stanisic & Stoljan Zupljanin where she participated in drafting orders, decisions and research memos, and briefing the three trial judges. She is now in Australia reading for the New South Wales Bar and plans to increase her qualifications in international law while continuing to encourage awareness of international humanitarian law in Papua New Guinea.

In 2008 the Trust made awards to Norah Nyeko and Goreth Gorret Kyakuwa both from Uganda.

Norah Nyeko: during the period of the scholarship Norah participated in drafting decisions and orders on behalf of the judges, undertook research on international criminal law topics, attended court to follow the testimony of witnesses, and drafted summaries of witness evidence. Her experience at the Tribunal gave her an increased understanding of how international humanitarian law works in practice and of the relevance of procedural rules. On her return to Uganda, Norah discussed with two non-government organisations – one dealing with the promotion of public international law, the other running mentorship programmes for secondary school pupils – how to raise awareness of international humanitarian law. Norah is now, after an internship with the International Criminal Court, working as a researcher with the non-governmental organisation, Human Rights Centre Uganda. She has also lectured on jurisprudence and as a tutorial assistant (international humanitarian law) at the Uganda Christian University’s Faculty of Law where her experience at international criminal tribunals has been particularly useful. She is hoping to set up a seminar in 2011 on the implementation of international criminal law in domestic courts in Uganda, in particular the specialised court which has been set up to try rebel Ugandan forces indicted by the International Criminal Court.

Goreth Kyakuwa writes that her internship was one of the most challenging yet rewarding experiences of her legal career. She worked on several cases where her duties included summarizing witness testimony and drafting decisions and portions of judgments. For one week she acted as court legal officer. She gained invaluable firsthand insight into how the legal principles and concepts of international criminal law may be applied to the factual situations of war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, and useful experiences of procedural matters. She also attended a number of lectures and conferences on international criminal law and international humanitarian law while in The Hague.

On her return to Uganda, Goreth drafted a syllabus for a course on international humanitarian and criminal law for the Faculty of Law, Makerere University. She plans to promote awareness of international humanitarian law at many levels of Ugandan society, including: translation of the basic principles of international humanitarian law into Swahili, encouraging publication of articles on the subject and lobbying for the rehabilitation of child soldiers.

From December 2008 to January 2009, Goreth was a legal intern with the Coalition for the International Criminal Court where she was responsible for two cases being heard by the Court (Thomas Lubanga; Jean-Pierre Bemba Gombo) and two situations (Darfur; Sudan). Since March 2010 she has been working as Visiting Professional with the Field Operations Section of the ICC, in particular, with her knowledge of Uganda, for the ICC’s Review Conference in Uganda. She has also had several publications in Annotated Leading Cases of International Law.