Dr. Mark Ellis
Executive Director International Bar Association
“The proposed global convention on crimes against humanity is a ground-breaking initiative that will reinforce the international community’s responsibility to ensure that those who commit heinous crimes are brought to justice. The new convention will obligate states to prosecute or extradite these individuals, emphasizing accountability over impunity. Lawyers worldwide should actively support and promote this landmark initiative.”
Professor Gareth Evans AC QC
Co-chair of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty; President Emeritus of the International Crisis Group; former Attorney-General and Foreign Minister of Australia
“Conscience shocking atrocity crimes continue to occur and cry out for both national and international justice. For all the immense effort in recent years that has gone into the Rome Statute creating the International Criminal Court, and to creating the ‘Responsibility to Protect’ norm endorsed unanimously by the UN General Assembly in 2005, there are still big gaps in our global legal armoury. This film, with its victim testimony giving a sharp and harrowing edge to the measured legal arguments of the international lawyers, makes a compelling case for a new international Convention for Crimes Against Humanity to fill those gaps. It should be compulsory viewing for all the world’s legal policymakers.”
Benjamin Ferencz
Former Nuremberg Prosecutor
On September 29, 1947, the “biggest murder trial in history” began in Nuremberg, one of the twelve Subsequent Nuremberg Proceedings. Twenty-two high-ranking Nazi officials responsible for killing over a million innocent men, women and children were convicted of “Crimes Against Humanity.” My opening statement as U.S. Chief Prosecutor of that case also referred to their deeds as “Genocide.”
The concept of “Crimes Against Humanity” and the legal protection of human rights has been slowly and painfully emerging for more than 100 years. It is high time for all nations to respect the “dictates of the human conscience” and accept a Convention binding all nations in the interest of our common humanity.
H.E. Ambassador Nazhat Shameem Khan
Permanent Mission of the Republic of Fiji to the United Nations
“A poignant journey from the Nuremberg trials when the term” crimes against humanity” was first coined to describe the atrocities of the holocaust, to the relentless crimes against civilians by their own nationals in the modern world. A reminder that the role of the international criminal law, must continue to adapt and grow as evidence unfolds of the failure of humanity to cease committing crimes against itself. A story of hope that work on a new Convention on Crimes against Humanity will progress development of the end of national and international impunity for crimes of rape, torture, enslavement, and genocide against civilian populations.”
Rt Hon Sir Geoffrey Palmer QC
Former Prime Minister of New Zealand
“This film graphically demonstrates a great gap in our legal system that needs to be filled urgently. We have known about crimes against humanity for a very long time. But the international and national legal communities have been neglectful of their duty to protect people against those crimes as they should have done. Too many people have suffered too much for too long without the perpetrators being brought to justice. Never Again: Forging a Convention for Crimes Against Humanity offers a big step forward in making the world a better place in which to live in peace.”
Professor Philippe Sands QC
Author of “East West Street: On the Origins of ‘Genocide’ and ‘Crimes Against Humanity’”
“‘Never again,’ it was said in 1945, in Nuremberg’s Courtroom 600. Yet the horrors continue and the need for new laws– on the protection of individuals, on the prevention of crimes against humanity–and their enforcement is today more pressing than ever. Washington University School of Law has been leading the charge, a clarion call for justice and humanity, for a convention for crimes against humanity. This necessary, urgent film tells us why.”
Ms. Patricia Viseur Sellers
Special Adviser to ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda
“The drafting of a crimes against humanity convention signifies and solidifies the international community’s quest to implement protection from atrocities that actually descend into evil. Never Again: Forging a Convention for Crimes Against Humanity is an enlightening film that captures the corresponding trek along the arc of justice, even as it bends.”