Thomas Obel Hansen – Senior Research fellow ICEL

Thomas is a senior lecturer with Ulster University’s School of Law and is a member of the University’s Transitional Justice Institute (TJI). He is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (UK), and serves as Academic Advisor for the Commonwealth Scholarship Commission; the Danish Foreign Ministry; and OSCE rule of law programmes. Thomas is a senior visiting research fellow at UC3M.

He obtained his LLM (2007) and PhD in Law (2010) from Aarhus University Law School in Denmark. Prior to joining the TJI, he worked as an assistant professor with the United States International University in Nairobi, Kenya and as an independent consultant on justice issues in the region.

His research focuses on transitional and international justice, including doctrinal and socio-legal and international relations perspectives on national and international justice processes. He has researched about justice topics in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda, Iraq, Palestine and elsewhere, which has been published with leading human rights and international law reviews such as George Washington, Notre Dame and Melbourne. His research findings have been used by international courts, parliamentary committees, media outlets such as The Guardian and he has contributed with blog posts in EJIL:Talk, Just Security and others.

His work on accountability issues links with ICEL’s focus areas; his contributions to ICEL will involve dedicated research activities and policy work relating to accountability for environmental crimes, including exploring how international criminal law and transitional justice frameworks can be used to promote justice for environmental damage.