Yousuf Syed Khan

Yousuf Syed Khan is Manager, Law and Policy at Legal Action Worldwide in Geneva. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow with the Strategic Litigation Project at the Atlantic Council, and an Associate Fellow at the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism – The Hague. His work focuses on the use of siege warfare, attacks against objects indispensable to the survival of a civilian population, and forced displacement as a warring strategy.

Yousuf has over 15 years of legal experience dealing with complex conflict situations, with specific expertise on the contributions and practice of UN atrocity inquiries. He has served on four commissions/investigative accountability bodies established by the UN Human Rights Council, regarding situations in Syria, South Sudan, Belarus, and Ethiopia. In these capacities, he conceptualised and led the drafting of over a dozen public UN reports, including the first-ever report by a UN-mandated mechanism on starvation as a method of warfare.

He also worked in Ukraine supporting the Government to prosecute starvation crimes; on human rights with the UN in Afghanistan; led a team monitoring the post-ISIS administration of justice countrywide with the UN in Iraq; and served with the Trial Chambers of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague.

Beyond Compliance Symposium: Applying a Systems Lens to Starvation as a Method of Warfare

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This post forms part of phase two of the Beyond Compliance Symposium: How to Prevent Harm and Need in Conflict, hosted by the Armed Groups and International Law blog. The introductory post can be found here. The symposium invites reflection on the conceptualisation of negative everyday lived experiences of armed conflict, and legal and extra-legal …

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Transnational Atrocity-by-Proxy: The Case for a Human Rights Council Inquiry into the Wagner Group

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This post forms part of the Wagner Symposium hosted by the Armed Groups and International Law blog. The introductory post can be found here. The symposium seeks to foster deeper discussion on how best to address the Wagner Group and its affiliated entities. Introduction Though ascribed by an array of names, the “Wagner Group” has been …

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