Amal Clooney is a Professor of Practice in International Law at the Blavatnik School of Government. Amal is one of the leading human rights lawyers in the world. She is a preeminent advocate for genocide survivors, political prisoners and wrongfully detained journalists. Her contributions have been recognised by the Committee to Protect Journalists, the American Society of International Law, the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, the Simon Wiesenthal Center, the United Nations, the World Economic Forum, the Kings Trust and Time Magazine. Most recently, in 2024, she won the Legal 500 Award for international lawyer of the year.

Amal’s practice has included representing victims of sexual violence in the first trials in which ISIS members have been convicted of genocide and crimes against humanity. She represents over 800 ISIS victims in the first case in a US court seeking to hold ISIS financiers responsible for supporting the terror group. She has represented Armenia in a case involving the Armenian genocide and was counsel to over 100 victims of crimes against humanity in Darfur, Sudan, at the International Criminal Court. In 2022, Amal led a Legal Task Force that advised the government of Ukraine on legal avenues to secure accountability for war crimes and compensation for victims in Ukraine.

Amal frequently represents political prisoners and has helped to secure the freedom of journalists imprisoned for their work across the globe. Her work has included defending Reuters journalists who uncovered evidence of genocide in Myanmar, journalists covering protests in Egypt and a leading investigative journalist exposing corruption in Azerbaijan, all of whom were released following her work. She currently represents Nobel laureate Maria Ressa, who faces decades behind bars for her work as a journalist in the Philippines. Amal previously served as a rapporteur for the International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute and as a member of the United Kingdom’s Team of Experts on preventing sexual violence in conflict zones. She has been appointed to the UK Attorney General’s Public International Law Panel of Counsel and as a Special Envoy by the former UK Foreign Secretary. She was also deputy chair of a Panel of Legal Experts on Media Freedom, chaired by a former UK Supreme Court President, that has provided legal and policy advice to over 50 governments. She is a regular public speaker and has addressed the UN Security Council and General Assembly on multiple occasions.

In 2016, Amal co-founded the Clooney Foundation for Justice, which provides free legal aid in defence of free speech and women’s rights in over 40 countries. Its work has led to dozens of journalists being set free and thousands of women receiving free legal support to defend their rights, including their rights to freedom from abuse, economic discrimination and child marriage. In 2022, the Foundation partnered with the Obama Foundation’s Girls Opportunity Alliance and Melinda French Gates to advance gender equality and reduce levels of child marriage worldwide. The Foundation also provides a fellowship program to help young women lawyers across Africa launch careers in human rights.

Amal was formerly a Visiting Professor at Columbia Law School. In 2020, she published, with Professor Philippa Webb, The Right to a Fair Trial in International Law. The book was awarded the American Society of International Law Certificate of Merit, the top prize in international law publishing. In 2021, they published a companion volume, The Right to a Fair Trial under Article 14 of the ICCPR, bringing together for the first time the complete travaux préparatoires to Article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Both books have made a significant contribution to counsel and their clients across the world and have been cited in judicial proceedings including by the UK Supreme Court. In 2024, Amal published Freedom of Speech in International Law, with Lord David Neuberger, outlining the minimum protections for speech enshrined in international law, focusing on laws that are being weaponized to silence the press.

Amal holds law degrees from Oxford University and New York University School of Law and prior to joining the London bar, she practiced as a litigation attorney at Sullivan & Cromwell LLP in New York.