Bassiouni, M. Cherif (Mahmoud Cherif Bassiouni), 1937–2017, Egyptian-American international criminal law jurist and human-rights advocate, b. Cairo. Bassiouni fought for Egypt in the Suez conflict (1956) but then was arrested for denouncing human-rights violations; he later fled Egypt (1961) and immigrated to the United States (1962). He taught at DePaul Univ. (1964–2009), and was a founder of its International Human Rights Law Institute (1990) and the Siracusa International Institute (1972) in Italy. He also served the United Nations in many capacities, including the drafting of the treaty against torture, and was several times a consultant for the U.S. government. He headed (1992–93) a United Nations Security Council commission's investigation of war crimes in the former Yugoslavia (1992); his report led to the creation of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. Following the creation of a similar tribunal concerned with the 1994 Rwandan genocide, Bassiouni chaired the drafting of the treaty (1998) that led to the establishment of the International Criminal Court. As UN monitor (2004–6) in Afghanistan, he criticized (2005) U.S. human-rights abuses, and his mandate was not renewed due to U.S. pressure. His many books include Crimes against Humanity: Historical Evolution and Contemporary Application (2011), Introduction to International Criminal Law (2d rev. ed., 2012), Libya: From Repression to Revolution (2013), The Shari'a and Islamic Criminal Justice in Time of War and Peace (2013), and Siracusa Guidelines for International, Regional, and National Fact-Finding Bodies (2013).
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