Christine Van Den Wyngaert

Christine Van Den Wyngaert (1952) is a Belgian criminal law expert and judge in several international courts.

She received three degrees from the Free University of Brussels: a law degree in 1974 (magna cum laude), a criminology degree in 1975 (cum laude) and a Ph.D in law in 1979 (summa cum laude).

Until taking up her appointment as an ad litem Judge of the ICTY, Van Den Wyngaert taught criminal law and criminal procedure at the University of Antwerp.

She has published widely in the fields of international and comparative criminal law. Her publications include: The political offence exception to extradition (1981), Criminal Procedure Systems in the European Community (1993) and various articles in law reviews.

In the period 1993-2000 she was Expert for the Directorate General XX of the European Commission and for UCLAF-OLAF, participated in different studies on fraud in the European Union (e.g. Corpus Juris pour la repression de la fraude transnationale en Europe).

Chris Van Den Wyngaert was reporter for the International Law Association (Buenos Aires in 1996 and Taipe in 1998) relating to extradition and human rights and a general reporter for the Association Internationale de Droit Pénal in Budapest relating to international criminal cooperation for organised crime. In 2001, she became a doctor honoris causa of the University of Uppsala in Sweden.

She was also an ad hoc Judge at the International Court of Justice in the Yerodia case between 2000 and 2002 (Case concerning the arrest warrant of 11 April 2000, Belgium vs. Democratic Republic of Congo).

On Monday 15 December 2003, Christine Van Den Wyngaert was sworn in as one of the new ad litem Judges of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) after their appointment by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, effective from that day. She has been assigned to the Trial Chamber sitting on the trials of Pavle Strugar and Fatmir Limay.

On 17 November 2005 she became a permanent judge of the ICTY. In 2006 she was awarded the Prize of the Human Rights League in Antwerp.

Since 11 March 2009 Chris Van Den Wyngaert is a judge in the International Criminal Court in The Hague. She was chosen for a nine years term and is assigned to the Trial Division. (Photos by ICTY and ICC.)

Stamp catalogue

Belgium 13 October 2007

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last revised: 28 March 2010