About Us
Climate Counsel is a non-profit outgrowth of Global Diligence LLP, a public interest legal advisory firm specialising in human rights, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.
Global Diligence lawyers first engaged in the inter-section between environmental destruction and international criminal law when investigating the crimes against humanity in Cambodia, rooted in the mass land grabbing and environmental destruction.
Climate Counsel was established to enable international lawyers to help address the climate emergency, by using their expertise in transnational crime and human rights protection. We partner with forensic architects, photographers, and scientists to build rigorous case-files and to present publicly our evidence.
Our Team
Executive Director:
Richard J Rogers
Richard J Rogers worked as a barrister in London, an attorney in San Francisco, and a senior United Nations lawyer at several UN war crimes tribunals – he was the Senior Legal Officer at the Appeals Chamber of the UN Tribunal for Yugoslavia, Principal Defender at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, and Chief Legal System Monitor in Kosovo. Richard has particular expertise in the cross-section between international criminal law and mass environmental destruction, and testified to this issue before the US Congress. He is a founding partner of Global Diligence LLP, an international legal advisory firm specialising in international crime and human rights. Richard is on the advisory board of the Stop Ecocide Campaign. He has lived and worked in Africa, Asia, America and Europe. Richard was Deputy Co-Chair of the Independent Expert Panel for the Legal Definition of Ecocide, that released the proposed definition on 22 June 2021.
Senior Counsel:
Lead Lawyer, Paulo Busse
Paulo Busse is a Brazilian lawyer with over 20 years’ experience advising and representing human rights and environmental organisations, such as Greenpeace (Brazil), Observatório do Clima, Global Witness, Amazon Watch, Stockholm Environment Institute, Global Canopy, and others. In collaboration with other lawyers, he has spearheaded a number of cutting-edge legal actions to protect the environment in Brazilian courts, including: A case before the Federal Supreme Court demanding the resumption of the Climate Fund; a case before Federal Courts to force the Government to correct Brazil’s Nationally Determined Contribution under the Paris Agreement (filed on behalf of Brazilian young leaders with the aid of Observatório do Clima); a case before the Federal Supreme Court to compel the Government to use massive financial resources unjustifiably frozen at the Amazon Fund.
Legal Consultant & Program Coordinator: Yanis Lunetta
Yanis Lunetta is a legal consultant specialising in corporate climate accountability, and corporate involvement in international crimes. He holds an LLM in International and Transnational Criminal Law from the University of Amsterdam and previously worked with a Defence Team at the Kosovo Specialist Chambers. Yanis has been involved in projects focusing on the role of financial actors and transnational corporations in facilitating international crimes and environmental destruction in Latin America and Sub-Saharan Africa.
Supervisory Board
Kate Mackintosh
Kate Mackintosh is the Executive Director of the UCLA Law Promise Institute Europe, an offshoot of the human rights institute she established at UCLA in 2018. Kate has worked in the fields of human rights and international criminal justice for almost three decades, helping to develop international criminal law in its fledgling years. She worked as a lawyer at international criminal tribunals and later served as the Deputy Registrar of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. For eight years she advised Doctors without Borders on international law, and has worked on the ground in a range of post-conflict or fragile states. She was deputy co-chair of the Independent Expert Panel for the Legal Definition of Ecocide.
Rupert Abbott
Rupert Abbott is the Executive Director of GiveOut, an international NGO supporting the global struggle for LGBTQI human rights. Rupert has over a decade of experience in human rights and developing not-for-profit organisations. He co-founded the human rights experts’ hub RightsStart and has held senior roles with the Human Rights House Foundation, Amnesty International, the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia and the Cambodian Center for Human Rights. Rupert chairs the Advisory Board at the Future Forum think tank in Southeast Asia.
Dr. Ines Peterson
Dr Ines Peterson is a judge in Germany, specialising in German national law and international criminal law. She is currently on secondment to the office of the German Federal Public Prosecutor's office, where she works on war crimes and crimes against humanity cases under universal jurisdiction. Prior to joining the German justice system, she worked as a UN lawyer at the International Criminal Tribunals for Yugoslavia and Rwanda. She holds a PhD in international criminal law, was a senior research assistant at Humboldt-University in Berlin.
Panel of Advisors
Wayne Jordash KC
International lawyer, Doughty Street Chambers, and Managing Partner of Global Rights Compliance.
Michael Kakande
Founder and chair of the African climate youth NGO Resilient40
Charlie Holt
Legal Counsel, Campaigns and Action, Greenpeace International.
Patrick Alley
Co-founder, Global Witness
Jojo Mehta
Co-founder and Executive Director, Stop Ecocide International. Chair of the Stop Ecocide Foundation.
Harriet Ssali
Criminal Justice Expert, UN Mission in Somalia, former Deputy Registrar at the International Crimes Division, Uganda.
Counsel
Alexandre Prezanti
Alexandre Prezanti specialises in international criminal law and human rights, undertaking evidential analysis in large complex cases, legal drafting and strategic litigation. From deforestation in South-East Asia, to environmental damage in Eastern Ukraine, Alexandre has led multiple investigations into environmental crimes, and pursues novel avenues for redress. He has professional knowledge of English, French and Russian and has been called to the Bar of England and Wales.
Nicholas Robson
Nicholas Robson is a barrister specialised in international humanitarian law. He has practiced at the UN Tribunal for the Yugoslavia and the International Criminal Court. With particular expertise in the Balkans, Palestine, Pakistan and Somalia, Nicholas has led several EU or UK-funded missions. Nicholas is actively involved in various initiatives to tackle climate change, including local government mitigation plans and reforestation projects.
Kristin Rosella
Kristin Rosella is a US lawyer with 15 years of experience advising and representing multinational corporations, accused in international tribunals, and survivors of mass atrocities and human rights abuses. She has trained over 1000 lawyers, members of law enforcement, and individuals from the private sector and NGOs on transnational crimes, financial crimes, and atrocity crimes. With co-counsel in France, she is spearheading a case against a French bank for financial crimes and alleged complicity in genocide, crimes against humanity, and torture.
Dr. Jelena Aparac
Dr. Jelena Aparac is an independent expert and lecturer in international criminal law. She was assigned by the UN Human Rights Council to serve on the UN Working Group on the Use of Mercenaries. With a PhD focused on the ‘international liability of corporations for international crimes committed in non-international armed conflicts’ she has contributed to the negotiations on establishing a Treaty on Business and Human Rights and has drafted several complaints against corporations for rights abuses. Dr. Aparac worked for Doctors Without Borders as Legal Adviser in international humanitarian law and has served in South Sudan, DR Congo and the Chad/CAR/Darfur border.
Sadaf Kashfi
Sadaf Kashfi is a licensed lawyer in New York, and British Columbia (Canada). She advises clients on complex cross-border immigration, human rights, business compliance, and criminal law. She has clerked at the Pre-Trial Chamber of the Extraordinary Chambers for the Courts of Cambodia and worked with Global Diligence LLP, investigating land grabbing and environmental destruction as international crimes.
Dr. Lucy Lu Reimers
Dr. Lucy Lu Reimers is an independent researcher and policy consultant specializing in international environmental law and governance. Her PhD explored the capacity of international legal frameworks to regulate carbon-intensive and biodiversity-threatening trade. As a researcher at the Geneva Global Governance Centre and the Cambridge Centre for Environment, Energy, and Natural Resource Governance, she published on a range of topics, including the relationship between corporate social responsibility standards and international human rights law. Dr. Reimers has worked for WWF International, the International Union for Conservation of Nature, and the International Labour Organization.
Investigators
INTERPRT
INTERPRT are a multidisciplinary team of architects, spatial designers and researchers who specialise in investigating environmental crimes. The team has conducted long-term research in multiple regions, from West Papua to Ogoniland. Head investigator, Nabil Ahmed, holds a PhD from the Centre for Research Architecture (Goldsmiths University, London) where he has a long-term affiliation with Forensic Architecture. He is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the faculty of architecture and design at Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU). INTERPRT are part of the Stop Ecocide Campaign.
Martin Middlebrook
Martin Middlebrook is a Human Rights and Conservation Photographer. He trained as a wildlife artist, began his photographic career as a wildlife photographer, before becoming an internationally respected photojournalist covering the war in Afghanistan, the refugee crisis, and political change in Europe. He has also directed for T.V. and written over a hundred articles, and several books. As a storyteller, he brings a uniquely passionate mix of skills in articulating complex stories through expressive visual and written narratives.