26 Aug Blogging from The Hague: The Peace Palace Centennial
[Travel and other expenses related to my participation in the “100 Years Peace Palace” program provided by the Government of the Netherlands and Radio Netherlands Worldwide]
August 28th will mark the 100th anniversary of the opening of the Peace Palace at The Hague. In commemoration of this, the Government of the Netherlands and Radio Netherlands Worldwide have brought a group of ten bloggers and online journalists from around the world to The Hague for a series of programs, meetings, and interviews surrounding the festivities. I am here on behalf of Opinio Juris.
Over the course of the next few days, I will post on the various meetings and events in which I will be participating. For those of you who like to use Twitter, there will also be tweets from various participants with the hashtag #peace100.
Tuesday we will begin in earnest with meetings with International Court of Justice President Peter Tomka, Secretary General of the Permanent Court of Arbitration Hugo Hans Siblesz, and various officials from the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The day will conclude with an event focusing on women’s rights, peace, and international law that will include presentations by 2011 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Leymah Gbowee, currently the Special Gender Advisor to the International Criminal Court, Brigid Inder, the Executive Director of the Women’s Initiative for Gender Justice, and Stephen Rapp, the U.S. Ambassador for War Crimes Issues.
I invite Opinio Juris readers to post any questions you would like posed to Judge Tomka, Hugo Hans Siblesz, Leymah Gbowee, Brigid Inder, or Stephen Rapp. I will blog on these events in the coming days and if I ask any of the reader questions, I will post the answers.
Stay tuned…
Thank you for covering this commemorative event Chris.
I would like to pose a few questions to the U.S. Ambassador for War Crimes Issues, Stephen Rapp, and the President of the International Court of Justice, Peter Tomka.
Given the recent news of the ICJ’s intention to establish a special Institute of International law in Tanzania (http://allafrica.com/stories/201308080745.html), how will the United States contribute to this process, and how will the proposed institute assist in building the capacity of African lawyers working in the field of international law? What are the long-term goals of such an institution for the development of the continent?