Since 2003, the Siracusa Institute organizes an annual Specialization Course in International Criminal Law for Young Penalists. The course is sponsored by the Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland Galway, the Middlesex University Department of Law (UK), and the International Association of Penal Law (AIDP).
Professor William A. Schabas, Professor of International Law at Middlesex University, chairs and coordinates the course, assuring the highest quality of education administered by some of the most erudite academics and researchers in the field of international criminal law.
The ICL course is attended on average by 40 young professionals from all over the world, who are recent law graduates, practitioners, academics or students, currently pursuing higher education or careers in the fields of international criminal law and international relations.
The course lasts 6 days; the daily sessions consist of keynote lectures, panel discussions and small-group exercises, which aim to stimulate interaction among participants.
The Siracusa International Institute for Criminal Justice and Human Rights will organize the 24th Specialization Course in International Criminal Law for Young Penalists ‘M. Cherif Bassiouni’ on “International Criminal Justice, Conflict Resolution and Transitional Justice” from Monday May 26, to Saturday, May 31, 2025. The course will take place in presence at the headquarters of the Siracusa Institute, located in Siracusa, Italy; online participation will also be allowed. The course will be sponsored by the Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland Galway, the Middlesex University Department of Law (UK), and the International Association of Penal Law (AIDP).
To be eligible for the course, participants should have a university degree in law, or other relevant education and experience, and be 35 years of age or under. Auditors who do not fulfil the eligibility criteria may also be accepted to the course. Thanks to its sponsors, the Institute will offer a limited number of scholarships to applicants from Developing and Less Developed Countries.
To apply for the Course, please fill out the Application Form.
The deadline for submitting your application is April 30th, 2025. All accepted participants will receive an acceptance letter in due course, with further information on technical details, methods of payment and relevant deadlines. Please note that applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, even before the deadline.
As spots and scholarships are limited, we strongly encourage you to apply as soon as possible.
The Siracusa International Institute for Criminal Justice and Human Rights will organize the 24th Specialization Course in International Criminal Law for Young Penalists ‘M. Cherif Bassiouni’ on “International Criminal Justice, Conflict Resolution and Transitional Justice” from Monday May 26, to Saturday May 31, 2025. The course will take place in presence at the headquarters of the Siracusa Institute, located in Siracusa, Italy; online participation will also be allowed. The final (oral) examination for the Diploma will take place exclusively online on Wednesday, June 4 and on Thursday, June 5.
The course will consist of 12 daily sessions spread over six days, for a total of 32 contact hours. The daily sessions will consist of keynote lectures, panel discussions and small-group exercises, which aim to stimulate interaction among participants.
The daily sessions will be programmed approximately between h. 9.30 and 17.30 CET. Each session will be broadcast live on a dedicated digital platform. In addition, during the course and for one week after the broadcast, participants will have access to video recordings of all daily sessions.
In advance of the course, all registered participants must access the Institute’s e-learning platform, from which the faculty’s recommended course readings and other relevant documents can be downloaded. Each participant will have their own personal profile for accessing these materials. PowerPoint presentations and other course resources will be added to the platform at the beginning or end of each session.
Once the course is completed, participants will have to take an online examination to receive the Diploma of the Siracusa International Institute. The examination will have a written and an oral component. Successful participants will be among the Institute’s graduates and eligible for a prize to be awarded to the person who achieves the best examination result, and two runners-up.
For participants in person, attendance is required at all live sessions: failure to attend more than two live sessions will disqualify participants from receiving the Diploma. For participants online, watching the recorded video of the sessions will qualify for attendance, but at least 5 sessions should be attended live; in any case, attendance of all live sessions is encouraged.
The Institute has a library containing over 25,000 volumes in International Criminal Law and Comparative International Law which are open to the use of participants in person throughout the course.
If you have any questions, please contact the Siracusa Institute at icl-course@siracusainstitute.org
Sessions will be announced soon.
Professor of International Law, Middlesex University, School of Law, UK; Professor Emeritus of International Criminal Law and Human Rights, Leiden University, The Netherlands; Honorary Chairman, Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland, Galway.
Professor William A. Schabas is professor of international law at Middlesex University in London. He is also professor emeritus of international criminal law and human rights at Leiden University and honorary chairman of the Irish Centre for Human Rights at the National University of Ireland, Galway.
Prof. Schabas is a ‘door tenant’ at the chambers of 9 Bedford Row, in London. He is the author of Genocide in International Law and many journal articles dealing with the implementation of the Genocide Convention. He is a past president of the International Association of Genocide Scholars.
Professor Schabas has acted as counsel or as an expert witness in genocide litigation before the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights, the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and national courts. From 2002 to 2004 Professor Schabas served as one of three international members of the Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Professor Schabas was named an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2006. He was elected a member of the Royal Irish Academy in 2007. He has been awarded the Vespasian V. Pella Medal for International Criminal Justice of the AIDP and the Gold Medal in the Social Sciences of the Royal Irish Academy.
Please see below the registration costs for the different categories of participants:
REGISTRATION COSTS
Participants in person € 850
Participants online € 500
The registration costs for all participants include access to the course online platform, including academic material and video recordings of all sessions. The registration costs for participants in person include lunches on course days (6 lunches in total) and 1 social dinner.
The Institute will offer a limited number of scholarships to participants in person coming from developing and less developed countries. The scholarship covers access to the course online platform, including academic material and video recordings of all sessions, lunches on course days (6 lunches in total), 1 social dinner and accommodation in HB for 7 nights (travel costs are not included). No scholarships will be available for participants online.
All accepted participants, including auditors and scholarship recipients, are required to join the International Association of Penal Law (AIDP) as Young Penalists (€ 45).
Membership information can be found on the AIDP website (www.penal.org). All accepted participants will receive an acceptance letter in due course, with further information on technical details, methods of payment and relevant deadlines. The application deadline is April 30th, 2025.
Eligibility
Cancellation Policy
Professor William A. Schabas (Canada/Ireland) – COURSE DIRECTOR
Professor of International Law, Middlesex University, School of Law, UK; Professor Emeritus of International Criminal Law and Human Rights, Leiden University, The Netherlands; Honorary Chairman, Irish Centre for Human Rights, University of Galway
Marko Milanovic
Professor of Public International Law, University of Reading School of Law, UK
Fannie Lafontaine
Professor of Criminal Law, Laval University, Faculty of Law, Québec, Canada
Diane Amann
Regents’ Professor of International Law Emily & Ernest Woodruff Chair in International Law, University of Georgia School of Law
Carmel Agius
Former President of the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals; former President of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia
Elies van Sliedreght
Professor of Public International Law, University of Reading School of Law, UK
Yvonne McDermott
Professor of International Criminal Law and International Human Rights Law, Hillary Rodham Clinton School of Law, Swansea University, UK
Dire Tladi
Judge, International Court of Justice
Kathryn Sikkink
Ryan Family Professor of Human Rights Policy, Harvard Kennedy School
Amelie Bécquart
Magistrate, French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Legal Affairs Department
Anita Ferrara
Lecturer at the Irish Centre for Human Rights, University of Galway
Jean-Philippe Reiland
Head of Central Office for Combating core International Crimes and Hate Crimes, France
The 23rd Specialization Course in International Criminal Law for Young Penalists on “International Criminal Law and Current Global Crises,” organized by the Siracusa International Institute, was held in Siracusa and online from May 27 to June 1, 2024. The course was sponsored by the Irish Centre for Human Rights at the University of Galway, the Middlesex University Department of Law (UK), and the International Association of Penal Law (AIDP).
This year’s program was attended by 50 participants (20 of whom attended online) from 29 countries, including Malaysia for the first time, representing 12 universities worldwide. The participants in the Specialization Course were primarily graduates, practitioners, academics, and students pursuing higher education or careers in the fields of international criminal law and international relations.
The program’s sessions were led by thirteen distinguished faculty members (2 of whom were online), with Professor William Schabas from Middlesex University’s School of Law serving as the course director.
During the six days of the program, the participants attended a total of 37 hours spread over 11 sessions covering the following topics:
• Genocide
• International Cooperation regarding Ukraine
• Ukraine and International Criminal Justice
• The International Criminal Court
• War
• Cinema and International Justice: The Nuremberg Trial
• International Criminal Justice, Climate Change, and Migration
• Palestine and Israel
• Syria, Sudan, Yemen, and Other Conflicts
• The Future of International Criminal Justice
A small-group exercise was organized on the fifth day of the course to stimulate interaction among participants.
Upon completion of the course, participants took an online examination to receive the Diploma from the Siracusa International Institute. Successful participants are now among the Institute’s graduates; the best examination result and the two runners-up were also awarded a prize:
Megan Swoger
Taras Leshkovych
Claire Pizzurro
The Siracusa International Institute’s 22nd Specialization Course in International Criminal Law for Young Penalists ‘M. Cherif Bassiouni’ on “75 Years: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and The Genocide Convention” was held in Siracusa and online from June 12 until June 17, 2023. The course was sponsored by the Irish Centre for Human Rights of the University of Galway, the Middlesex University Department of Law (UK) and the International Association of Penal Law (AIDP).
The Specialization Course was attended by 57 participants all over the world (23 of which online), from Canada to Mauritius, from Costa Rica to South Africa. These individuals were recent law graduates, practitioners, academics or students, currently pursuing higher education or careers in the fields of international criminal law and international relations. Twenty-eight different countries, as well as seventeen different Universities, were represented among the participants involved in the course. The Specialization Course was taught and attended by twelve distinguished faculty members.
At the end of the Specialization Course, all the participants attended 12 daily sessions spread over six days, for a total of 32 contact hours. The daily sessions consisted of keynote lectures, panel discussions and small-group exercises, which aimed to stimulate interaction among participants. The lectures involved the following topics:
• Human rights, genocide and the protection of groups
• New crimes, new treaties, new phenomena
• Decolonising the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
• Cinema and International Justice: The Nuremberg Trial
• Investigating International Crimes
• Assessing the Genocide Convention
• The International Criminal Court: Contributions and Challenges
• Reforming the Institutions
• The Future of International Justice
Once the course was completed, participants took an online examination to receive the Diploma of the Siracusa International Institute. Successful participants are among the Institute’s graduates; the best examination result, and the two runners-up were also awarded a prize:
Maryam Arfaoui
Marco Edgardo Florio
William Fortin
The 21st Specialization Course in International Criminal Law for Young Penalists on “The Changing Landscape of International Justice” was held in Siracusa and online from May 23 until May 28, 2022. The course was sponsored by the Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland Galway, the Middlesex University Department of Law (UK), and the International Association of Penal Law (AIDP) with the support of the Manríquez y Benavides Abogados Ltda (Chile).
The Specialization Course was attended by 72 participants all over the world (38 of which online), from Afghanistan to Dominican Republic, from Qatar to Sierra Leone. These individuals were recent law graduates, practitioners, academics or students, currently pursuing higher education or careers in the fields of international criminal law and international relations. Twenty-nine different countries, as well as nineteen different Universities, were represented among the participants involved in the course.
The Specialization Course was taught and attended by thirteen distinguished faculty members (5 of which online), including Christine Van den Wyngaert, Judge of the Kosovo Specialist Chambers and former Judge of the International Criminal Court, Jan Wouters, Full Professor of International Law and International Organizations and founding Director of the Leuven Centre for Global Governance Studies at KU Leuven, and Leila Sadat, Special Adviser on Crimes Against Humanity to the ICC Prosecutor and James Carr Professor of International Criminal Law at the School of Law of the Washington University in St Louis.
At the end of the Specialization Course, all the participants attended 11 daily sessions spread over six days, for a total of 29 contact hours. The daily sessions consisted of keynote lectures, panel discussions and small-group exercises, which aimed to stimulate interaction among participants. The lectures involved the following topics:
• International crimes
• New crimes, new phenomena
• Cinema and International Justice: The Nuremberg Trial
• Actors and processes
• Human rights, armed conflict and international criminal law
• Jurisdictional issues
• Transitional justice, victims and reparations
• The future of international criminal law
Participants who wanted to receive the Diploma of the Siracusa International Institute took an online examination once the course was completed. Successful participants are among the Institute’s graduates; the best examination result, and the two runners-up were also awarded a prize:
Konstantina Desponia Stavrou
Ana Teresa Corzanego Khatounian
Sai Sathyanarayanan Venkatesh
Participants who choose not to take the final examination received a certification of participation in the course.
The 20th Specialization Course in International Criminal Law for Young Penalists on “Human Rights, Criminal Justice and International Law” was held online from July 5 until July 9, 2021. The course was organized in cooperation with the Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland (Galway, Ireland), the Middlesex University Department of Law (London, UK) and the University of Palermo Department of Law (Italy), and with the support of the International Association of Penal Law (AIDP – France), the College for Criminal Law Science of Beijing Normal University (China), Swansea University, Hillary Rodham Clinton School of Law (UK), Manríquez y Benavides Abogados Ltda (Chile), the Canadian Partnership for International Justice and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) (Québec, Canada).
The Specialization Course was attended by 114 participants all over the world, from Australia to Colombia, from The Philippines to Nigeria. English was the official language of the course. These individuals are recent law graduates, practitioners, academics or students, currently pursuing higher education or careers in the fields of international criminal law and international relations. Forty-six different countries, as well as forty-four different Universities, were represented among the participants involved in the course.
The Specialization Course was taught and attended by thirty-one distinguished faculty members, including the President of the International Criminal Court Piotr Hofmański, Aminata Touré, former Minister of Justice and former Prime Minister of Senegal, and Paolo Pinto de Albuquerque, former Judge of the European Court of Human Rights.
At the end of the Specialization Course, all the participants attended 16 daily sessions spread over five days, for a total of 29 online contact hours. The daily sessions consisted of keynote lectures, panel discussions and small-group exercises, which aimed to stimulate interaction among participants. The lectures involved the following topics:
• Current Challenges of International Criminal Justice
• International Crimes: Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity
• Fair Trial Guarantees and Rights of the Defence
• Investigation of International Crimes
• Sexual and Gender-Based Crimes and International Law
• History of International Criminal Law
• Jurisdictional Issues of International Criminal Justice
• Victims and Reparations
• Human Rights, International Criminal Law and Armed Conflict
• Transitional Justice and Restorative Justice
Participants who wanted to receive the Diploma of the Siracusa International Institute took an online examination once the course was completed. Successful participants are among the Institute’s graduates; the best examination result, and the two runners-up were also awarded a prize:
Anderson Javiel Dirocie De Leon
Gabriele Fiorella
Diana Tognini Saba
Marieta Akhvlediani
Mariam Bezhanishvili
Audrey Demeyer
Rens Koppejan
Audrey Lamarre
Andrés Morales
Adina-Loredana Nistor
Marina Oliveira Teixeira dos Santos
Lilla Ozorakova
Sara Pan Algarra
Abbiba Ivy Princewill
Ruben Surur Paul Valfredo
Participants who choose not to take the final examination received a certification of participation in the course.
The 2019 Specialization Course in International Criminal Law for Young Penalists on ‘Human Rights and Criminal Justice’ was held in Siracusa from June 2 until June 10, 2019. The course was sponsored by the International Association of Penal Law (AIDP – France), the University of Palermo Department of Law (Italy), the Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland (Galway, Ireland), the Middlesex University Department of Law (London, UK), the Canadian Partnership for International Justice (Québec, Canada) and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
The Specialization Course was attended by 59 participants from all over the world, from Argentina to South Korea, from New Zealand to Syria. English was the official language of the course. These individuals are recent law graduates, practitioners, academics or students, currently pursuing higher education or careers in the fields of international criminal law and international relations. Thirty-three different countries, as well as twenty-six different Universities, were represented among the participants involved in the Specialization Course. The course was taught and attended by eleven distinguished faculty members.
The Specialization Course included all day lecture sessions as well as a Small Group Exercise and a Moot Court Competition. At the end of the Course, all the participants attended 14 working sessions for a total of 42 actual academic contact hours. The lectures involved the following topics:
• Fair trial guarantees and rights of the defence
• Definitions of crimes and human rights
• Human rights, international criminal law and international humanitarian law: defining the relationship
• Cinema and International Justice: The Nuremberg Trial
• Rights and victims
• Equality, non-discrimination and criminal justice (including sexual and gender-based violence)
• Punishment, detention and human rights
• Transitional justice and restorative justice
• Juvenile justice
During the moot court competition, the participants were divided into teams of three. The moot court competition culminated with a final round, which involved the top three teams from the preliminary rounds. The oral arguments took place before a panel of 3 faculty member judges. Moot court competition awards were given to the winning team:
Mr. Ahmed Tony (Egypt)
Ms. Lisa Urban (Germany)
Mr. Domenico Vallario (Italy)
and to the two best oralists:
Ms. Lisa Urban (Germany)
Ms. Lilya Belfer (Russia)
At the conclusion of the Specialization Course, there was an awards ceremony. Every participant in the Specialization Course received a certificate of attendance to the course.
The Siracusa International Institute for Criminal Justice and Human Rights | via Logoteta, 27 – Siracusa, Italy | Tax Code 80001810896
