Strategic litigation panel
On 19 September 2024, at the IBA Annual Conference in Mexico City, the IBA Human Rights Law Committee hosted a strategic litigation panel entitled ‘Financial and personal costs of human rights litigation: how to go the distance?’
This session first delved into the question of how human rights activists can obtain sufficient resources to maintain prolonged litigation in a world of finite resources. The session then turned to consider the very real physical and psychological costs of acting in such cases (given the traumatic subject matter), risks to security and the limited prospects of implementation. Panellists explored the place of funding in human rights litigation, commercial policies that may prohibit law firms from acting, as well as commercial and legal conflicts of interest.
The session was co-moderated by Tiffani Brownley-Meijer of the American Red Cross and Shirley Pouget of DLA Piper, both officers of the IBA Human Rights Law Committee.
Panellists included:
- Shiva Amiri, Amiri Law Firm, Toronto, Ontario; Website Officer, IBA Human Rights Law Committee;
- John Balouziyeh, United Nations, Erbil; Treasurer, IBA Human Rights Law Committee; Michele Gentile and Marcus Vetter, Co-Directors, War and Justice;
- Dr Felicity Gerry KC, Libertas Chambers UK & Crockett Chambers Melbourne, Asia Pacific Regional Forum Liaison Officer, IBA Criminal Law Committee;
- Steven Gray, Independent Adviser, London; and
- Jonathan Hafetz, Seton Hall Law School, Newark, New Jersey; Membership Officer, IBA Human Rights Law Committee.