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Kelly Askin
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 J.
Skelly Wright Fellow, Visiting Lecturer, School of Law
Yale University, United States
Research: Empowering women Through International Law
and Process
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Senior Legal Advisor, International Justice, Open Society
Justice Initiative; J. Skelly Wright Fellow and Visiting
Lecturer, Yale Law School. Former Director, International
Criminal Justice Institute and Acting Executive Director,
War Crimes Research Office, American University. Dr. Askin
has served as a legal advisor/consultant to the International
Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and the Appeals
Chamber for the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda,
and other international institutions. She has also served
as a Visiting Scholar or Fellow at Harvard University, Notre
Dame Law School, and Washington College of Law. She has
published extensively, including the highly acclaimed books:
War Crimes Against Women: Prosecution in International War
Crimes Tribunals (Kluwer Law International, 1997) and the
4-volume treatise Women and International Human Rights Law
(co-editor, Transnational Publishers, vol I, 1999; vol II,
2000; vol III, 2002; vol IV, forthcoming). She has been
interviewed extensively, including by the New York Times,
CNN, and NPR.
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Empowering Women In and Through International Law
and Process
International law and international/ized courts have provided
women and girls with powerful tools to redress discrimination
and violence. International criminal law and international
humanitarian law prohibits gender based violence, particularly
sexual violence. In the past ten years, the international
community has condemned sexual violence as amongst the most
serious international crimes committable and instituted
measures to redress these and other serious crimes.
The International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia
(ICTY) and for Rwanda (ICTR), established by the United
Nations in 1993 and 1994 respectively, have successfully
prosecuted various forms of sexual violence. These tribunals
have recognized rape as an instrument of genocide, a crime
against humanity, a war crime, a form of torture, a means
of persecution, and indicia of enslavement. The International
Criminal Court (ICC), began investigating its first cases
this year, and is authorized to prosecute rape, sexual slavery,
enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced sterilization,
and other forms of sexual violence, including trafficking.
Internationalized (hybrid) courts set up to prosecute war
crimes and crimes against humanity in places like Sierra
Leone, East Timor, Kosovo, and Cambodia, also have authority
to prosecute gender related crimes.
This research will focus on: 1) how these international
courts have investigated, indicted, and prosecuted gender
crimes, 2) why sexual violence is finally being prosecuted
in international war crimes tribunals, 3) the impact that
international prosecutions have domestically and regionally,
4) how the jurisprudence of these international/ized tribunals
can be used to prevent and punish gender crimes worldwide,
5) how the presence of women in positions of authority in
international institutions and courts has helped shape the
law and improve the progress, 6) how providing redress for
sex crimes empowers women, and 7) how to keep the momentum
going and continue improving accountability for gender crimes
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