In association with the International Commission of Jurists

Symposia

19 Jun

[Geoff Gilbert is a Professor at the School of Law and Human Rights Centre, University of Essex, Senior Adviser to PPLA, DIPS, UNHCR and Head of Research for the Criteria Volume of the new Handbook] The 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees is celebrating its 75th birthday. In the same way as if it were a human being, after...

|
19 Jun

[The Honourable Russel W. Zinn is a retired Justice of the Federal Court of Canada and President of the International Association of Refugee and Migration Judges] The Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees [the Convention] was adopted on July 28, 1951.  It is the foundational international treaty defining who a refugee is and their rights.  Originally limited to European refugees...

|
18 Jun

[Dr. Vincent Chetail is Professor of International Law and Director of the Global MIgration Centre at the Geneva Graduate Institute of International and development Studies] Anniversaries invite reflection, but they can also induce complacency. The seventy-fifth anniversary of the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees falls in a moment of acute tension: never have so many people needed its protection and never has...

|
18 Jun

[Matthew Gillett is the Chair of the Platform of Independence Experts on Refugee Rights, a member of the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention and a Senior Lecturer at Essex Law School (UK)] Introduction This year we commemorate 75 years since the adoption of the 1951 Refugee Convention relating to the Status of Refugees. The 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol...

|
17 Jun

[Karolína Babická is a Senior Legal Adviser with the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ). Rosa Tibbetts is a Legal Intern with the ICJ. Stavros Papageorgopoulos is a Senior Legal Officer with the European Council on Refugees and Exiles.] Across Europe, some political actors are nowadays questioning the ability of the international legal order, including instruments such as the 1951 Refugee Convention and the...

, and |
17 Jun

[Liliana Lyra Jubilut and James Milner are Co-Chairs of the Global Academic Interdisciplinary Network from the Global Compact on Refugees] The global refugee regime is experiencing two relevant 75th anniversaries: first of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) last year; and, second, of the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees in July 2026. Celebratory...

and |
17 Jun

[Guy S. Goodwin-Gill is Emeritus Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, Emeritus Professor of International Refugee Law, University of Oxford, and Honorary Professor, Faculty of Law & Justice and Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law, University of New South Wales, Sydney. Jane McAdam is an Australian Research Council Laureate Fellow and Scientia Professor of Law at the Kaldor Centre for International Refugee Law,...

and |
16 Jun

[Elizabeth Tan is the Director of UNHCR’s Division of International Protection and Solutions] In 1951, in the aftermath of one of the most devastating wars the world had ever known, the international community recognized the need for international cooperation, grounded in law and humanity, for people who had fled their countries in need of safety and protection. In response, States adopted...

|
16 Jun

[Massimo Frigo is a Senior Policy Officer in the Protection Policy and Legal Advice Section (DIPS) at the UNHCR. Cornelis (Kees) Wouters is a Senior Refugee Law Adviser in the Protection Policy and Legal Advice Section (DIPS) at the UNHCR.] Seventy-five years is a veteran age for everyone; even for a multilateral treaty. It is sufficient time to live through paradigmatic changes,...

and |
08 Jun

[Dr Sergey Sayapin is Professor of Law at KIMEP University (Almaty, Kazakhstan) and Distinguished Visiting Global Scholar at the NUS Centre for International Law (2025)] If global risk has become the defining condition of contemporary international law, its most immediate and consequential expression lies in human vulnerability. Climate change destabilises ecological systems, technological innovation diffuses agency and outpaces control – yet it is through human exposure...

|
01 Jun

[Deborah Ruiz Verduzco is  Executive Director of the Trust Fund for Victims (TFV) at the International Criminal Court (ICC). Prior to her appointment, she was Director of the Secretariat of the Coalition for the International Criminal Court. She previously led the Civil Society Development Department at the International Commission on Missing Persons, served as Special Assistant to two Presidents of...

, , , and |