Humanitarian Law Center

A regional non-governmental human rights and humanitarian law organization, the Humanitarian Law Center was founded in 1992 following the outbreak of armed conflicts in the former Yugoslavia. The HLC is based in Belgrade and has regional offices in Priština and Prizren in Kosovo, Novi Sad in Vojvodina (opened in 1997), and in Podgorica, Montenegro (opened 1999). Over 70 lawyers, attorneys, researchers, analysts and other dedicated professionals work for the HLC on a full- or part-time basis. Since its founding, the HLC has researched killings, disappearances, camps, torture of prisoners of war, and the patterns of ethnic cleansing in times of armed conflict by interviewing witnesses and victims. Upon collecting a large body of documentation on war crimes, the HLC in August 1994 began cooperating with the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) at The Hague. And, as of June 1999, it has been cooperating also with Prosecutor's Offices in Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo, providing them with information and expert assistance with regard to war crimes trials.