International Humanitarian Fact-Finding Commission – election of the 15 members

The newly composed Commission will take office in March 2012. Each member serves in his or her personal capacity and on the basis of the principle of impartiality. In its capacity as Depositary State of the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols, Switzerland invited the 72 States that have recognised the competence of the Commission to a diplomatic meeting in Bern last Friday. The 62 member States present at the meeting elected the fifteen members of the Commission for a term of office of five years.

The IHFFC is a permanent institution at the disposal of the international community established pursuant to article 90 of the First Additional Protocol to the Geneva Conventions of 1949 to ensure the implementation and respect for international humanitarian law. The experts who compose the Commission stand ready if a State involved in an armed conflict requests the services of the Commission to investigate facts that may constitute war crimes or other violations of international humanitarian law. The Commission is also empowered to offer its good offices to restore respect for the law. In addition, it is involved in advocacy and dissemination of international humanitarian law.

The secretariat of the Commission is provided by the Directorate of International Law of the Swiss Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA). The following candidates were elected (in alphabetical order of their country of origin):  

Prof. Ghalib DJILALI                                        Algeria
Amb. Susana M. RUIZ CERRUTI                       Argentina
 Prof. Eric DAVID                                            Belgium
 Prof. Thilo MARAUHN                                      Germany
Prof. Stelios PERRAKIS                                    Greece
 Prof. Flavia LATTANZI                                     Italy
Prof. Shuichi FURUYA                                       Japan
Dr. Justinas ŽILINSKAS                                   Lithuania
 Dr. Elzbieta MIKOS-SKUZA                              Poland
Capt. Valery S. KNYAZEV                                 Russian Federation
Prof. Miodrag STARČEVIĆ                                Serbia
Dr. Gisela PERREN-KLINGLER                           Switzerland
Dr. Mohamed M. AL KAMALI                             United Arab Emirates
Prof. Charles GARRAWAY                                 United Kingdom
Col. Hugo C. CORUJO SANSEVIERO                  Uruguay 

Address for enquiries:

Information FDFA
Bundeshaus West
CH-3003 Bern
Tel.: +41 58 462 31 53
Fax: +41 58 464 90 47
E-Mail: info@eda.admin.ch

Publisher:

Federal Department of Foreign Affairs