| Year of birth | 1970 |
| Year of call | 1992 |
| Inn | Lincoln’s Inn |
| Circuit | South Eastern |
| Appointments | Senior Research Fellow, King’s College, London; Member, CBA’s working group on the ICC Act 2001; Member, international justice sub-committee of the IRC of the Bar Council; Member, Foreign & Commonwealth Office, Pro Bono Human Rights Committee; |
| Awards | Awarded the 1999 John D & Catherine MacArthur Foundation Fellowship on
International Peace and Security; Alexander Maxwell Law Scholarship Trust Award 2001. |
| Full CV |
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A specialist in all areas of international criminal and human rights law.
He has previously worked as a Senior Crown Prosecutor and at the Law Commission. From 1997-2000 he was a Legal Advisor in the Office of the Prosecutor of the United Nations International Criminal Tribunals for the Former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. He has substantial experience in immigration and asylum law and has advised the Home Office “in house” and regularly acts on behalf of appellants. He is on the Attorney-General’s list of approved counsel.
Karim maintains a busy international practise and was instructed in 2001 as defence counsel before the Special Courts in East Timor. In 2003 he acted as defence counsel in the ICTY case of Prosecutor v Limaj (acquitted on all counts after full trial; Prosecution appeal against acquittal dismissed 2007). In 2004, he was appointed by the Registry of the ICTY to act as independent counsel to the Former Chief of Staff of the Bosnia armed forces in Prosecutor v (General) Sefer Halilovic (appeal allowed). Karim has also provided legal advice in the ICJ case of Liberia v Sierra Leone (concerning the arrest warrant against Charles Taylor.) He also acted as co-counsel in the case of Prosecutor v Alex Brima before the Special Court of Sierra Leone. In 2005 he was offered the post of international legal advisor to the Appeals Chamber of the Iraqi Special Tribunal (IST). Between March 2006 and June 2007 he acted as lead defence counsel for Charles Taylor, the former President of Liberia, charged with 11 counts alleging crimes against humanity and war crimes in Sierra Leone. He is currently acting as Defence counsel in Prosecutor v Prlic et al ("The Greater Croatia case") before the ICTY.
In addition, Karim continues to advise Governments on all aspects of Public international law and international criminal law. He lectures widely on international humanitarian law which has taken him as far afield as the University of Tsinghua, Beijing, China and the University of Florence, Italy. For the past 7 years he has been a regular lecturer at the Advanced Officers Course at the Joint Services Command and Staff College, Watchfield, Swindon. He has also lectured at Sandhurst Military Academy.
Publications
| Co-author of: | Archbold International Criminal Courts (Sweet & Maxwell). Second
Edition published in Dec 2005. Third Ed (2009 forthcoming). "EU Enlargement and Human Rights" in Security Dimension of EU Enlargement (Manchester University Press). |
| Co-editor of: | International Criminal Law Reports (Cameron May) International Criminal Evidence (forthcoming 2008: Cameron May). |
| Contributor to: | Human Rights Practice (Sweet & Maxwell) and A Commentary to the Rome Statute on the ICC (Baden-Baden) (Second Edition 2008). |
Notable Cases