IHSA is delighted to announce that it will hold Annual Lectures, offering a chance for a well-known figure from the world of Humanitarian Studies a keynote opportunity to speak about a timely subject.

Second IHSA Annual Lecture | Rapid Changes Ahead: Technology and Evidence Gathering relating to Allegations of International Crimes in times of War

The second lecture will take place on Wednesday 21 May 2025 from 16:00-17:30 CEST at the International Institute of Social Studies in The Hague. The lecture will be given by Judge Fergal M. Gaynor, renowned international jurist who is a Judge at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers in The Hague and is the Reserve International Co-Prosecutor at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia.

Judge Gaynor formerly worked as Counsel for the Prosecution at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and the Extraordinary Chambers at the Courts of Cambodia. He has also represented defendants in Ireland and victims in proceedings at the International Criminal Court.

Judge Gaynor will be speaking around the potentially enormous change in the ways that technology, including artificial intelligence, will be used in identifying, collecting, analysing and disclosing evidence relating to crimes allegedly committed during armed conflicts. He will touch on topics including accountability for attacks on protected objects and persons, as well as the rapid change in the role that advanced technology can play in the near future in ensuring due process and accountability before international courts and tribunals.

After the lecture, we will be joined by several panellists from across the humanitarian sector and academia to discuss accountability and protection of humanitarians, ensuring accountability in a multi-polar world, and the role of accountability within the humanitarian system in general. Following the lecture and panel discussion, there will be time for a Q&A, and networking drinks. We invite students, researchers, humanitarian actors, and anyone invited to come along!

The lecture and panel discussion will also be available to livestream online.

Registration to attend

Lecture Archive 

First IHSA Annual Lecture |  War and Humanity | May 2024

The first lecture took place on Thursday 23 May 2024, at the Literature House in Bergen. The inaugural lecture was introduced by Antonio De Lauri (President, IHSA), and given by Khaled Quzmar, (General Director of Defense of Children Palestine).

It was followed by a reflection by Francesca Albanese (UN Special Rapporteur on the Occupied Palestinian Territories), and a roundtable featuring:

There are a series of five blogs resulting from the first IHSA Annual Lecture:

1. ‘War between successive peoples is considered a moral evil, and indicates an increasing collapse of the values of human rights and law‘ by Thomas Ansell (IHSA Coordinator) and Khaled Quzmar (General Director of the Defense for Children International Palestine)
2.  ‘“The principle of humanity in war’’: a reflection on the IHSA Annual Lecture 2024’ by Andrew Cunningham (IHSA Treasurer)
3. ‘IHSA Annual Lecture Reflection: Starvation crimes, network shutdowns, and obstacles to humanitarian action in Gaza and Sudan’ by Susanne Jaspars (IHSA Vice-President)
4. IHSA Annual Lecture Reflection: Reconsidering ‘humanitarian values’, shifting the power, and who’s knowledge matters by Carla Vitantonio (IHSA Board Member)
5. Munzoul Assal (Professor at the universities of Khartoum and Bergen and Scholar at Risk at the Chr Michelsen Institute) provides an in-depth discussion of the long-term crisis and instability facing Sudan in the blog Counting the dead won’t save lives: looking beyond humanitarian disaster in Sudan.