Judge Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf is Juris Doctor from Somali National University and holds a PhD from the Graduate Institute (1980). Prior to his doctorate, he completed post-graduate studies in international law at the University of Florence (Italy).
From 1975 to 1980, Dr Yusuf served as Somalia’s delegate to the Third United Nations Conference on the Law of the Sea. He was Lecturer at the Somali National University from 1974 to 1981 and at the University of Geneva from 1981 to 1983. He has also been guest professor and lecturer at a number of universities and institutes in Switzerland, Italy, Greece and France.
From 1987 to 1992, Dr Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf was Chief of the Legal Policies Service of United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) before becoming its Representative and Head of its New York Office from 1992 to 1994. From 1994 to 2001, he served as Legal Advisor (up to 1998), then Assistant Director for African Affairs to United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) in Vienna. From March 2001 to January 2009, Dr Yusuf was Legal Adviser and Director of the Office of International Standards and Legal Affairs for United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). As of February 6, 2009, he had been a judge at the International Court of Justice. In 2011, Judge Yusuf gained a seat in the advisory council of The Hague Institute for Global Justice.
Dr Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf is Founder and General Editor of the African Yearbook of International Law and a member of the Institut de droit international (Geneva). He is also one of the founders of the African Foundation for International Law and Chairman of its Executive Committee. In addition, Judge Yusuf has authored several books and numerous articles on various aspects of international law as well as articles and op-ed pieces in newspapers on current Northeast African and Somali affairs. He is a member of the editorial advisory board of the Asian Yearbook of International Law, and a member of the Thessaloniki Institute of Public International Law and International Relations curatorium.
Dr Yusuf is fluent in Somali, English, French, Arabic, and Italian.
Dr Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf will be at the Institute on Thursday 8 March 2012, 18:30 to give a Public Lecture on African Courts of Justice and the Judicial Settlement of Disputes between States in Africa.
This lecture is organised by the Geneva Master in International Dispute Settlement (MIDS) , a joint programme of the Graduate Institute and the Law Faculty of the University of Geneva.
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