ICC Prosecutor Appoints Juan E. Méndez as Special Adviser on Crime Prevention
The Office of the Prosecutor is pleased to announce the appointment of Juan E. Méndez as Special Adviser on Crime Prevention. As stated in the Preamble of the Statute, our mission is to end impunity for the most serious crimes of concern to the international community as a whole - war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide - and to contribute to the prevention of such crimes in the future. Mr. Méndez’s role will be to advise Prosecutor Moreno-Ocampo on how to maximize the impact of our work and to prevent the commission of massive atrocities. He will contribute to Office strategy and policy papers. Mr. Juan Méndez will be working on a pro bono basis.
Former President of the International Center for Transitional Justice, Juan Méndez was also the Special Adviser to the Secretary General (UN) on the Prevention of Genocide until 31 March 2007. Prior to that, he was Director of the Americas division (1982-1993) and later General Counsel (1994-1996) of Human Rights Watch, and Executive Director of the Inter-American Institute of Human Rights in Costa Rica (1996-1999). From 2000 to 2003, he was a member – and, in 2002, the President – of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, Organization of American States. He has taught at the University of Notre Dame Law School (1999-2004), at Georgetown Law School and Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), as well as at the Oxford Masters Program in International Human Rights Law. He was born in Argentina, where he was detained and tortured in 1975-1977, and has practiced law there and in the United States. During his detention, Amnesty International adopted him as a “Prisoner of Conscience.”
Juan Méndez has written extensively on the impact of international justice and its potential deterrent effect. He is the second person appointed by the OTP as Special Adviser in accordance with Article 42(9) of the Rome Statute and joins Professor Catharine A. MacKinnon, Special Gender Adviser, as a member of the OTP’s Scientific Council.
For more information, please contact:
Ms Nicola Fletcher, OTP Media Liaison
+31 (0)70 515 8071
Email: [email protected]
OTP News Desk
+31 (0)70 515 8759
Email: [email protected]
Source: Office of the Prosecutor