Yousuf Syed Khan

Yousuf Syed Khan has over 15 years' legal experience dealing with complex conflict situations, with specific expertise in starvation as a method of warfare and siege warfare.

Yousuf has served on four commissions and investigative/accountability bodies established by the UN Human Rights Council (Syria; South Sudan; Belarus; and Ethiopia). In these capacities, he conceptualised and led the drafting of over a dozen public UN reports – including the first-ever report by a UN-mandated mechanism on starvation as a method of warfare. Several of his most visible legal contributions have centred on the use of siege warfare, attacks against objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population, and forced displacement as a warring strategy.

In addition to these roles, Yousuf co-led a team of international and local lawyers to implement a national investigative strategy on accountability for starvation as a method of warfare in Ukraine; worked in human rights with the UN in Afghanistan (both in Kabul and in a Taliban stronghold on the southeastern border with Pakistan); led a team monitoring the post-ISIL administration of justice nationwide with the UN in Iraq; and served with the Trial Chambers of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague.

Before joining the United Nations, he was a Legal Consultant to Professor M. Cherif Bassiouni, analysing war crimes and crimes against humanity in Libya, a Legal Adviser on issues of belligerent occupation and de facto annexation in the Golan Heights, and an attorney practising at a prominent law firm in the United States.

Yousuf is also a recognised Prosecution Expert on crimes affecting cultural heritage and on the law of occupation, and is rostered in both areas with Justice Rapid Response (JRR), an intergovernmental mechanism of criminal justice experts. He has published various peer-reviewed articles and chapters in renowned international journals and edited volumes, and speaks and lectures frequently on international humanitarian law.

Yousuf holds a Juris Doctor from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and an Advanced LL.M. in Public International Law from Leiden University, where he wrote his thesis under the supervision of eminent jurist John Dugard. Having worked in 10 countries across four continents, he is currently based in Geneva.