International Humanitarian Law for “Tomorrow’s Lawyers”

Russian aggression has accentuated the value of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) for lawyers. On February 5-6, 2020, the “Tomorrow’s Lawyer” program, with the support of the US Embassy in Ukraine, held an intermodal event – a training on international humanitarian law “Russian aggression and international humanitarian law”.

The initiators and trainers of the event were Andrii Yakovlev, participant of the third season of the program and Anastasia Martynovska, head of the organization “Regional Centre for Human Rights”. Andrii and Anastasia are the trainers of the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union on International Humanitarian Law.

The training included the following issies:

• IHL Stories (wars in the history of mankind and how the rules of war were created);
• The concept and structure of IHL, IHL Principles, implementation on a temporal and territorial basis;
• Types of armed conflict (international; non-international; mixed; occupation; annexation);
• Crimea (beginning of armed conflict, qualification; participants of armed conflict; obligations of occupier state);
• The Rome Statute and the International Criminal Court;
• East (Practice: Conflict Qualification; Parties to Armed Conflict)
• National practice (Article 110 – encroachment on territorial integrity; Article 111 – state treason; Article 438 – violations of the laws and customs of war);
• Relationship between IHL and other areas: International Criminal Law and and International Public and Private Law.

The training was developed by trainers and experts along with the Program team. In the development of training the author’s materials of the experts of the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union for trainers in International Humanitarian Law were used.

Trainers and experts:

Andrii Yakovlev – participant of the third season of the “Tomorrow’s Lawyer” Program, experienced trainer in International Humanitarian Law. Since 2017, actively engaged in human rights activities. Collaborates with the Centre for Strategic Affairs of the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union and the human rights organization Regional Center for Human Rights, has practical experience in representing the victims of armed conflict in the European Court and at national level.

Anastasia Martynovska – Head of the Human Rights Organization “Regional Centre for Human Rights”, which specializes in solving complex legal issues arising from the occupation of the Crimean peninsula. As a lawyer for the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union since 2014, she has specialized in filing complaints with the European Court of Human Rights in relation to human rights abuses in an uncontrolled territory, and mentors Crimean lawyers and lawyers responsible for the Crimean focus of the Centre for Strategic Affairs.

Roman Martynovsky – leading expert of the human rights organization Regional Centre for Human Rights. Chair of the Board of the Ukrainian Legal Aid Foundation. Member of the Working Group on the Reintegration of Temporarily Occupied Territories within the Legal Reform Commission. He has experience in conducting dozens of seminars and trainings for lawyers, prosecutors, human rights defenders and civil servants. Approximately 20 years of experience representing the European Court of Human Rights and experience preparing and reporting to the International Criminal Court in the context of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the occupied Crimea.

***

“Tomorrow’s Lawyer” is a powerful network of lawyers uniting opinion leaders in the legal profession, who provide legal assistance in accordance with the highest ethical standards, act as agents of change in society and leaders in the professional community.

The “Tomorrow’s Lawyer” Program was launched in 2016 and first implemented within the “Quality and Accessible Legal Aid” Project, carried out by the Canadian Bureau for International Education with the support of the Government of Canada in cooperation with the Legal Aid Coordination Centre. It is currently being implemented and developed with the support of the US Embassy’s Law Enforcement Section in Ukraine, the “Tomorrow’s Lawyer” NGO, in partnership with the Ukrainian Bar Association and the Bar Association of Legal Aid Providers.