Christine Chinkin

Christine Mary Chinkin (born 1949) is a Professor of International Law and founding Director of the Centre for Women, Peace and Security at the London School of Economics and Political Science^[1] and the William W. Cook Global Law Professor at the University of Michigan Law School.

She was a member of the four-person United Nations Fact Finding Mission on the Gaza Conflict created by the United Nations Human Rights Council.^[2] The commission's Report accused Israel of intentionally targeting civilians, which caused great outrage in Israel.^[3] The head of the commission Richard Goldstone subsequently changed his mind, but three other commission members (including Chinkin) continued to insist on the correctness of their conclusions despite the fact that "no domestic investigations at all have been started into any of the allegations of international crimes committed by members of Palestinian armed groups in Gaza".^[4][5]

From January 2010, she is a member of the Human Rights Advisory Panel^[6] of the United Nations Mission in Kosovo. She is the Chair of the International Law Association, appointed in 2021.

Chinkin studied law at the University of London, earning an LLB with honors in 1971 and an LLM in 1972. She later received a second LLM from the Yale Law School in 1981 and completed her PhD at the University of Sydney in 1990. She has served on the law faculty at the University of Sydney and as dean of the law faculty at the University of Southampton.^[7]

She was appointed Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George (CMG) in the 2017 Birthday Honours for services to advancing women's human rights worldwide.^[8]

Christine Chinkin was scientific advisor to the Council of Europe Committee that drafted the Istanbul Convention. She is currently a member of the steering board of the Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict Initiative of the UK Government, and specialist advisor to the House of Lords Select Committee on Sexual Violence in Conflict.