International Commission of Jurists - History

History

Born at the ideological frontline of a divided post-war Berlin, the ICJ was established in memory of a West German lawyer, Walter Linse, who, along with Theo Friedlander, was active in exposing human rights violations committed in the Soviet zone. On 8 July 1952, East German intelligence agents abducted and delivered Linse to the KGB and Linse was executed in Moscow one year later for "espionage". This event led to the decision by a group of lawyers to found an organisation dedicated to the defence of human rights through the rule of law and its inaugural conference was convened in 1952. Today, the ICJ has national sections and affiliates in over 70 countries.

The ICJ was initially funded by the Central Intelligence Agency through the American Fund for Free Jurists, but the CIA's role was not known to most of the ICJ's members. American founders like Allen Dulles and John J. McCloy conceived it as a counter to the International Association of Democratic Lawyers controlled by the Soviet Union. Ex-CIA officer Philip Agee considered that the ICJ was "set up and controlled by the CIA for propaganda operations." The CIA funding became public in 1967, but the organization survived the revelations after a period of reform under Secretary General Sean MacBride, and through Ford Foundation funding.

From 1970 to 1990, Niall MacDermot was Secretary-General, succeeding Sean MacBride. MacDermot rescued the ICJ from its association with the CIA, to the forefront of the international human rights movement.

The ICJ was responsible for the Declaration of Delhi on the rule of law in 1959.

In 1978, the ICJ established the Centre for the Independence of Judges and Lawyers (CIJL). It was instrumental in the formulation and adoption of the UN Basic Principles on the Independence of the Judiciary and the UN Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers and its mandate is to work for their implementation.

In 1980, the ICJ received the European Human Rights Prize by Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

In 1986, the ICJ gathered a group of distinguished experts in international law to consider the nature and scope of the obligations of States parties to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. The meeting witnessed the birth of the Limburg Principles on the Implementation of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which continue to guide international law in the area of economic, social and cultural rights.

In the 1990s, a number of important international developments took place as a result of initiatives by the ICJ. These included the UN Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance and the recommendation by the Programme of Action of the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna to work on the setting up of an International Criminal Court. This was the direct result of an international conference on impunity, organised by the ICJ under the auspices of the United Nations in 1992, which adopted an appeal asking the Vienna conference to "set up an international penal tribunal…in order to finally break the cycle of impunity". In November 2006 the ICJ held an international meeting in Yogyakarta for LGBT rights and published The Yogyakarta Principles in March 2007.

The ICJ also initiated the drafting of the set of Principles for the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights through Action to Combat Impunity and the Basic Principles and Guidelines on the Right to a Remedy and Reparation for Victims of Violations of International Human Rights and Humanitarian Law, both under examination at the UN Human Rights Commission and also received the United Nations Prize in the Field of Human Rights in 1993.