Antonio Cassese: The Stubborn Sparrow Antonio Coco, Paola Gaeta, Giulia Pinzauti, Salvatore Zappalà

In October 1995, the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) delivered a decision stating for the first time that war crimes can also be committed in non-international armed conflict. As the first President of the ICTY, Antonio Cassese ('Nino') played a key role in the drafting of the decision and the development of international criminal justice. The co-hosts discuss the legacy of this landmark decision and the early days at the ICTY with Professor Georges Abi-Saab, who was at that time a Judge serving in the ICTY Appeals Chamber. In an interview given when he was President of the ICTY, Nino explains the challenges to bring criminal cases for war crimes against political and military leaders.

In the late 1980s, Antonio Cassese ('Nino') contributed to the growth of the protection of human rights in the European Union by leading an impactful research project at the European University Institute (EUI). The co-hosts Paola Gaeta and Antonio Coco discuss such pioneering work with guest Andrew Clapham, an active member of that research project. They get a testimony about that endeavour by Philip Alston, who led another study at the EUI together with Joseph Weiler, that eventually contributed to the adoption of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union in 2000.

In this episode the co-hosts Salvatore Zappalà and Giulia Pinzauti discuss the contribution of Antonio Cassese (‘Nino’) to the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) with Antonio Marchesi, a renowned expert on torture. Nino describes an inspection to a detention unit. His friend and former legal officer at the Yugoslav Tribunal, the late John Jones, tells the story of Nino inspecting a cell in the UN detention unit. Andrew Clapham reads an excerpt explaining why Nino chose to take part in the Committee’s work.

Antonio Cassese ('Nino') was the first President of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, a hybrid court established in 2007 to try those responsible for the attack that killed the former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafic Hariri and others. In February 2011, under Nino’s presidency, the Tribunal rendered a controversial decision on the definition of the international crime of terrorism. The co-hosts Antonio Coco and Giulia Pinzauti discuss the decision and Nino’s contribution to it with guest Guido Acquaviva, the Tribunal's Chef de Cabinet at the time.

This episode discusses the findings on genocide and working methods of the UN Commission of Inquiry in Darfur, which Antonio Cassese chaired in 2004-2005. Paola Gaeta and Salvatore Zappalà interview Fannie Lafontaine, who worked with Antonio Cassese as his legal assistant at the time.

This episode introduces the figure of Antonio Cassese, a giant of international law who was known to his friends simply as 'Nino'. Nino’s voice tells the story of the sparrow, to which the podcast owes its title.