European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights

The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights ( ECCHR; German: European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights) is an independent non-profit human rights organization. It was founded by a group of lawyers in 2007.

Objectives and self-

The aim of the ECCHR is to protect the human rights that are guaranteed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other human rights declarations and constitutions by legal means and enforce.

Impetus for the founding of the ECCHR was the assessment that those responsible for serious human rights violations often operate on an international level across borders. Spectacular criminal cases in recent years, such as in Spain against former Chilean President Augusto Pinochet led the club founders on review that human rights cases should be coordinated more effectively by an independent organization in Europe and developed strategies for the legal fight.

ECCHR sees itself as part of the civil rights movement and the new social movements. A creative and effective use of the law is seen as an engine for social and social change. For this self-understanding is followed by a proximity to the U.S. civil rights movement of the 60s.

Organization

The work of the ECCHR is headed by its General Secretary Wolfgang Kaleck, one of the initiators of the project, which is national chairman of the Republican lawyers and attorneys Association eV ( RAV ) and the German lawyer of Edward Snowden at the same time and the Secretary General of the European Democratic Lawyers was and coordinated.

ECCHR is a member of the Human Rights Forum and the Coalition against Impunity. It works, among others, the American Civil Liberties Union and the Fédération Internationale des Droits de l' Homme of Ligues and the Center for Constitutional Rights together.

ECCHR his seat in the House of Democracy and Human Rights in Berlin. It is registered at the Amtsgericht Charlottenburg and at the competent tax office as a non-profit organization. It was 100,000 British pounds from the Sigrid Rausing Trust, one of the largest philanthropic foundations English, promoted.

Fields of activity

Content ECCHR works on the following topics:

  • Human rights violations in connection with the war against terrorism
  • Transnational Corporations and Human Rights
  • Universal jurisdiction

Legal work

Education and public relations

ECCHR wants to contribute to the discussion on the protection of human rights and their development through public relations. These conferences and other public events are organized and produced their own publications and websites. ECCHR also offers conferences and continuing education courses for attorneys, lawyers and students. In addition, in a trainee program trainees and young lawyers work together with experienced lawyers at ECCHR cases and procedures.

  • So ECCHR held in October 2007 in collaboration with Amnesty International and the Republican Lawyers Association, a conference on the war against terrorism, among others, Theo van Boven and Thilo Weichert acted as spokesman.
  • In October 2008, organized in cooperation with Bread for the World and Misereor, a conference on " Transnational Corporations and Human Rights" with speakers such as the UN Special Rapporteur Olivier de Schutter and Saskia Sassen.
  • In November 2008, the ECCHR next to the Berlin Chamber of Lawyers, Amnesty International and the Republican Lawyers Association co-hosted a training event on complaints before the European Court of Human Rights which, among other things, the Federal Government Commissioner appeared on human rights issues at the Federal Ministry of Justice Almut whiting as a speaker.

Publications

  • ECCHR: CIA - ' Extraordinary Rendition ' Flights, Torture and Accountability - A European Approach, Berlin 2009 (2nd edition), ISBN 978-3-00-026794-9
  • Wolfgang Kaleck and Miriam Saage - Maass: Transnational Corporations in court. About the threat to human rights by European companies in Latin America, Heinrich- Böll -Stiftung, Berlin 2008, ISBN 978-3-927760-78-3
  • ECCHR publishes a newsletter several times a year in German and English.
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