Guided Tour

Wolfgang Kaleck, specialised in European and international criminal law and human rights, founded the human rights law organization ECCHR in 2007 together with other lawyers working internationally, and is its general secretary. The Berlin-based ECCHR investigates and supports a range of legal proceedings in Europe against state and non-state actors suspected of committing crimes against international law.

In the field of business and human rights, ECCHR uses legal mechanisms to combat inhumane working conditions. Since 1998 he has been an advocate for the Koalition gegen Straflosigkeit (Coalition against Impunity) which fights to hold Argentinian military officials accountable for the murder and disappearance of German citizens during the Argentinian dictatorship era. From 2004 until 2008, together with the New York Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), he pursued criminal proceedings against members of the US military, including former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Wolfgang Kaleck is a member of the Centre of European Law and Politics at the University of Bremen (ZERP) and the Forum for International and Criminal and Humanitarian Law (FICHL). Two of his books were recently published in German by Klaus Wagenbach: Mit zweierlei Maß. Der Westen und das Völkerstrafrecht (Double Standards: The West and International Criminal Law), 2012, and Kampf gegen die Straflosigkeit. Argentiniens Militärs vor Gericht (Fighting against Impunity: Argentina’s Military on Trial), 2010. Since recently, Wolfgang Kaleck is the German legal advisor of Edward Snowden.