Court of Conciliation and Arbitration

Former French Minister of Justice Robert Badinter was appointed as President of the OSCE Court of Conciliation and Arbitration in May 1995. He has since been re-elected for two further six-year terms, beginning in 2001 and 2007.

Born in 1928 in Paris, Badinter was a successful lawyer before he was nominated Minister of Justice in 1981.

During his term of office from 1981 to 1985 he was successful in promoting civil liberties in the French justice system including the abolition of the death penalty, the State Security Court and military Courts in peacetime as well as improving the rights of victims of crime. In 1986, he was appointed President of the Constitutional Council, a post he held until 1995.

In 1991, he became a member of the European Community's Arbitration Commission of the peace conference on the former Yugoslavia. He became a member of the French Senate in 1995 and was re-elected in 2004.

Badinter was instrumental in the creation by the Stockholm Convention of 1992 of the OSCE Court of Conciliation and Arbitration, which offers mediation and arbitration to states wanting to settle conflicts peacefully.

The Convention entered into force on 5 December 1994, and the first meeting of the members of the Court was held on 29 May 1995 in Geneva. Badinter was elected President, and former German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher his Deputy.