The COVID-19 pandemic and its associated health, political, and economic impacts continued to affect the work of the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ). The organization responded to this with remarkable resilience and resourcefulness, having completed 79% of the planned activities in 40 countries and reaching 5,239 participants through training and capacity-building initiatives. Our Annual Report for 2021 provides a summary of all the work we did to safeguard human rights and uphold the rule of law in that year.
In 2021, we successfully launched a five-year Strategic Plan that will guide our way forward as an organization while providing the flexibility to adapt to changing circumstances. During the year, the ICJ continued to advocate against human rights violations across the globe amidst the ongoing challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Ensuring the ICJ’s strategic stability for the next five years is crucial as new challenges emerge posed by resurgent authoritarian populism, unprecedented movements of people driven by increasing social disparity and climate change, intrusive new technologies, and the aftermaths of the pandemic…After 70 years as global advocates for justice and human rights, the International Commission of Jurists remains a vital, necessary organization with increasing reach around the world, notwithstanding significant internal and external challenges across the globe,” – Sam Zarifi, ICJ Secretary General.
The regional and thematic programs contended with ongoing COVID-19 restrictions to meet their commitments around the world and continued to influence the development of norms in key areas such as the policy response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the protection of human rights in cyberspace in Asia, Africa, and Europe. The program on Global Accountability moved ahead in leading a global assessment of international accountability mechanisms, including through a ministerial level conference organized with support from the Kingdom of the Netherlands and ongoing assistance from the governments of Germany and Finland. The organization has also embarked on an emergency effort to assist Afghanistan’s judges and prosecutors who sought asylum after the Taliban’s takeover.
Click the button below to download the report and read more about our work in 2021:
ICJ Annual Report 2021