Executive Master: 44 Professionals Start their Learning Journey in Geneva and Online

The 44 participants enrolled this year in our Executive Master in International Law in Armed Conflict – a part-time programme designed for professionals with demanding jobs and responsibilities – just started the programme with a ‘Meet and Greet Online Session’ and a course on the basic principles of international humanitarian law (IHL).

For the 2020-2021 academic year, 18 practitioners will follow the programme in Geneva and 26 online.

Those online are based in countries like Australia, Azerbaijan, Benin, Cambodia, Canada, Colombia, Georgia, India, Kenya, Palestine, Peru, Syria, Sweden, the United Kingdom or the United States.

‘As we have many professionals following the programme online, we organized for the first time a ‘Meet and Greet Online Session’ with participants, professors and staff to get to know each other’s, create bonds and develop a group dynamic’ underlines Dany Diogo, Coordinator of the Master’s Programmes at the Geneva Academy.

With professionals working for the BBC, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the International Organization for Migration, MINUSCA, the OSCE in Ukraine, the UN Office of Counter-Terrorism, UN Women, the UN in Syria, the World Organization against Torture, or for several permanent mission in Geneva, discussions and exchanges during classes promise to be very rich.

‘The diverse backgrounds of professionals enrolled in the programme is, in itself, a real added value: they bring their own experience and can apply the legal concepts discussed in class to their daily work. The fact that we have diplomats, journalists, lawyers, activists and humanitarians in the same class also allows participants to hear different positions, arguments and approaches’ underlines Professor Gloria Gaggioli, Director of the Geneva Academy.

Moving One’s Career Forward

This year’s programme entails two new courses on the implementation of IHL and IHRL. The first one is given by Dr Lindsey Cameron, Head of the unit of Thematic Legal Advisers in the Legal Division of the International Committee of the Red Cross and the second one is given by Professor Olivier de Frouville from the University of Paris II and member of the UN Committee on Enforced Disappearances.

The introduction of these two courses will allow participants to better understand how institutions, which are often Geneva-based, can contribute to enforcing the rules they study, as well as avenues to ensure the implementation of IHL and IHRL.