Professor William Schabas, Middlesex University, on “The Trial of the Kaiser”. The presentation is part of the lecture series “The Father of All Things – World War I and International Security Law, organized by Professors Christian Tams and Robin Geiss, and will analyse how plans for a “Trial of the (German) Kaiser”, even though they never materialised, shaped the modern discipline of International Criminal Law.

Professor William A. Schabas is professor of international law at Middlesex University in London and professor of international human rights law at the University of Leiden. He is a leading international criminal law expert and author of more than twenty books including Unimaginable Atrocities, Justice, Politics and Rights at the War Crimes Tribunals (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), The International Criminal Court: A Commentary on the Rome Statute (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010), and Genocide in International Law (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2nd ed., 2009). He was a member of the Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission (20022004), has drafted the UN Secretary General’s Reports on the death penalty in international law, and regularly appears in proceedings before international courts and tribunals.