Professor of international law, McGill University
Payam Akhavan is a professor of international law at McGill University, member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration, and a former UN prosecutor at The Hague, having worked as a human rights lawyer in Bosnia, Rwanda, and other conflict zones around the world. In 2017, he delivered the CBC Massey Lectures, published as “In Search of a Better World: A Human Rights Odyssey”, which became the bestselling non-fiction book in Canada.
Former UN prosecutor and human rights scholar Payam Akhavan reflects on the multiple meanings of genocide and why semantic debates should not get in the way of doing what is necessary to end violence against Indigenous women and girls.
Human rights scholar Payam Akhavan reflects on how today’s brand of hateful populism differs from that of the past, and what is required to change course.
Following
Canada’s declaration that crimes against the Rohingya constitute ‘genocide,’ Payam
Akhavan asks: Do the refugee camps in Bangladesh hold the key to prosecutions by the International Criminal Court?
