Judicial independence is the concept that the judiciary should be independent from the other branches of government. That is, courts should not be subject to improper influence from the other branches of government or from private or partisan interests. Judicial independence is important to the idea of separation of powers.
Taslim Olawale Elias was a Nigerian jurist. He was Attorney-General and Chief Justice of Nigeria and a judge and President of the International Court of Justice. He was a scholar who modernised and extensively revised the laws of Nigeria.
The International Commission of Jurists (ICJ) is an international human rights non-governmental organization. It is a standing group of 60 eminent jurists—including senior judges, attorneys and academics—who work to develop national and international human rights standards through the law. Commissioners are known for their experience, knowledge and fundamental commitment to human rights. The composition of the Commission aims to reflect the geographical diversity of the world and its many legal systems.
Anne Bayefsky is a human rights scholar and activist. She currently directs the Touro College Institute on Human Rights and the Holocaust and is a barrister and solicitor of the Ontario Bar. Her areas of expertise include international human rights law, equality rights, and constitutional human rights law.
Theodor Meron is a former President of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and Presiding Judge of the Appeals Chambers of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and the ICTY. He was elected President of the ICTY by his fellow judges on 19 October 2011, and again on 1 October 2013.
Honourable Chief Justice Muhammad Haleem, LL.D. (HC), HI served as the 10th Chief Justice of Pakistan from 1981 to 1989, the longest serving Chief Justice in the history of the judicial branch in Pakistan. He was even endorsed by successive future regimes in Pakistan.
V. S. Mani was an Indian legal scholar. He was the founder and director of Gujarat National Law University and an expert in the field of public international law. He was also the founder and director of the Seedling School of Law and Governance at Jaipur National University in Rajasthan, India. He died on 22 August 2016.
Sri Lankabhimanya Christopher Gregory Weeramantry, AM was a Sri Lankan lawyer who was a Judge of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) from 1991 to 2000, serving as its vice-president from 1997 to 2000. Weeramantry was a judge of the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka from 1967 to 1972. He was also served as an emeritus professor at Monash University and the president of the International Association of Lawyers against Nuclear Arms.
Herman Liebaers was a Belgian linguist. He was director general of the central Belgian Royal Library and Marshal of the Royal Household of the Royal Court of Belgium. He was married to Isa Hereng. They had a son, Dirk, and a daughter Inge Liebaers, who was a Professor of genetics at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel.
Israeli law is based mostly on a common law legal system, though it also reflects the diverse history of the territory of the State of Israel throughout the last hundred years, as well as the legal systems of its major religious communities. The Israeli legal system is based on common law, which also incorporates facets of civil law. The Israeli Declaration of Independence asserted that a formal constitution would be written, though it has been continuously postponed since 1950. Instead, the Basic Laws of Israel function as the country's constitutional laws. Statutes enacted by the Knesset, particularly the Basic Laws, provide a framework which is enriched by political precedent and jurisprudence. Foreign and historical influences on modern-day Israeli law are varied and include the Mecelle and German civil law, religious law, and British common law. The Israeli courts have been influenced in recent years by American Law and Canadian Law and to a lesser extent by Continental Law.
The Indian Judiciary administers a common law system in which customs, securities and legislation, all codify the law of the land. It has in fact, inherited the legacy of the legal system established by then the colonial powers and the princely states since the mid-19th century, and has partly retained characteristics of practices from the ancient and medieval times.
The Judicial Commission of New South Wales is an independent statutory corporation of the New South Wales Government that provides sentencing information and continuing education to and examines complaints made against judicial officers in New South Wales, Australia.
Professor Shimon Shetreet is a former Israeli politician who held several ministerial portfolios between 1992 and 1996. He is currently the Greenblatt Chair of Public and International Law at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Charles Ralph Simpson, III is a Senior United States District Judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky.
A sovereign state, in international law, is a political entity that is represented by one centralized government that has sovereignty over a geographic area. International law defines sovereign states as having a permanent population, defined territory, one government, and the capacity to enter into relations with other sovereign states. It is also normally understood that a sovereign state is neither dependent on nor subjected to any other power or state.
Shabtai Rosenne was a Professor of International Law and an Israeli diplomat. Rosenne was awarded the 1960 Israel Prize for Jurisprudence, the 1999 Manley O. Hudson Medal for International Law and Jurisprudence, the 2004 Hague Prize for International Law and the 2007 Distinguished Onassis Scholar Award. He was the leading scholar of the World Court - the PCIJ and ICJ and had a widely recognized expertise in treaty law, state responsibility, self-defence, UNCLOS and other issues of international law.
Eva Brems is a Belgian university professor, human rights defender and politician. She is a senior lecturer in human rights and non-Western law at Ghent University. Besides her academic engagements, Brems has also been politically active. From 2006 until 2010, she was the president of the Flemish division of Amnesty International. In the spring of 2010 she announced her candidacy in the 2010 Belgian general election for the Chamber of Representatives. She now represents the constituency of Leuven for the environmentalist party Groen.
Riyaz Punjabi, is a former Professor and Vice Chancellor at the University of Kashmir. He was granted the Padma Shri, one of India's highest civilian awards, in 2011. In 2008 he was granted an Honorary Professorship at the International University Vienna for his contribution in "Strengthening International Relations in the Sphere of Education". He also won the Amity Academic Excellence Award from Amity International Business School, in 2009, the Fzil Memorial Award in 2009, and the Adbi Markaz Kamraz award in 2010.
Founded in 1999 and headquartered in Prague, Czech Republic, the CEELI Institute is an independent, non-profit, non-governmental organization for advancing the rule of law. The CEELI Institute's mission is to advance the rule of law across various countries in order to protect fundamental rights and individual liberties, promote transparent, incorruptible, accountable governments, create the foundation for economic growth and development, and promote peaceful resolution of disputes. Through innovative training programs, the CEELI Institute educates legal professionals with a focus on providing tools to promote human rights, strengthen democratic institutions, fight corruption, and support free market economies. The Institute is located at the Villa Grebovka in Prague.
Wouter Jacques "Wout" van Bekkum is a Dutch professor of Middle East Studies at the University of Groningen. His expertise lies in the field of Semitic languages and culture, especially the different varieties of the Hebrew language and Hebrew poetry from Late Antiquity until the Middle Ages.
