I. Introduction

I. I am professor emeritus at Humboldt University Berlin, where I was on the Law Faculty from 1995 to 2004 as Director of the Institute of International Law. Before that time, I was on the Faculty of Law and Economics of the University of Bonn, also as Director of the Institute of international Law (1972 to 1995). I have written and edited many books, with specific emphasis on human rights and on international settlement of disputes, being one of the editors of the Commentary on the Charter of the United Nations (Oxford, 2002) and of the Commentary on the Statute of the International Court of Justice (Oxford, 2006). In addition to my teaching and scholarship, I have served as President of the German Society of International Law (1993-1997). In 1997, I was elected to the Institut de droit international, the leading society of scholars of international law. I served as a member of the UN Human Rights Committee (1977 to 1986) and as member and chairman of the UN International Law Commission (1985 to 1996). From 1995 to 1997 I was a judge of the Administrative Tribunal of the Inter-American Development Bank, and from 1999 to 2008 I discharged the same function as a judge of the Administrative Tribunal of the African Development Bank. I have served as counsel in cases before the European Court of Human Rights, the Court of Justice of the European Communities and before the International Court of Justice. I have also served as arbitrator in cases pending before the International Centre for Settlement of investment Disputes.