Human Rights Officer (Legal Advisor)

The Human Rights Officer (Legal Advisor) provides expert legal advice on human rights, international humanitarian law and international criminal law. The role involves leading legal research, managing investigations, providing strategic advice, and managing a team to advance human rights accountability and reporting.

Responsibilities

• Lead and provide expert legal advice to team and leadership on applicable human rights, international humanitarian law and international criminal law frameworks, standards, legal conclusions and accountability measures, identifying legal risks and recommending accountability measures.
• Lead substantive legal research and analysis to identify and address cross-cutting patterns and violations of human rights, international criminal law and international humanitarian law, ensuring findings are integrated into broader strategic and policy frameworks.
• Manage investigation planning oversee the formulation of legal opinions, establish and refine evidentiary standards, and validate the attribution of responsibility to alleged perpetrators.
• Oversee the quality assurance and legal vetting of opinions, memoranda, and high-level briefing documents on human rights, international humanitarian law and international criminal law matters, to ensure strategic alignment and authoritative legal accuracy.
• Define the legal framework for public reports on human rights, international humanitarian law and international criminal law matters, ensuring findings, conclusions and recommendations align with the mandate and legal standards, and take accountability for the quality of legal outputs.
• Provide strategic advice on evidence preservation and lead coordinated information sharing with jurisdictions and other accountability mechanisms, ensuring alignment with office policies and established frameworks.
• Lead and manage engagement with external actors, including human rights and accountability mechanisms, national and international courts and civil society organizations to advance office priorities in line with strategic objectives.
• Manage and coordinate the activities of the team, including hiring, training, assigning tasks and responsibilities, evaluating performance, and ensuring that deadlines are met.

Requirements

• An advanced university degree (Master’s degree or equivalent) in human rights, law, political science, international relations, social sciences, economics, public policy, sustainable development, humanitarian affairs or related field.
• A first-level university degree in combination with two additional years of qualifying work experience may be accepted in lieu of the advanced university degree.
• A minimum of seven (7) years of experience in human rights or related areas is required.
• Relevant experience may include, but is not limited to political affairs, public affairs, international relations, law, social sciences, economics, development, humanitarian affairs, or other related areas.
• Knowledge of international humanitarian law and its application is required.
• At least 5 years of demonstrated knowledge of human rights monitoring, documentation, analysis, research and reporting methodologies, including planning, coordinating and conducting field missions is required.
• Ability to conduct legal analysis is required.
• Skills in drafting human rights reports, policy and other documents is required.
• Skills to integrate digital, open-source, satellite, and forensic evidence into analysis and reporting is desirable.
• Knowledge of investigative methodologies related to international law and human rights is desirable.
• Knowledge of international human rights law, norms, and standards is desirable.
• English language proficiency at UN Level III in reading, writing, listening and speaking.

Skills

• Human Rights Monitoring
• Human Rights Documentation
• Human Rights Analysis
• Human Rights Reporting
• Legal Analysis
• Drafting Human Rights Reports
• Policy drafting
• International Humanitarian Law
• International Human Rights Law
• International Criminal Law
• Field Mission Coordination
• Legal Research
• Investigation Methodologies
• Digital Evidence Integration
• Open-source evidence analysis
• Satellite evidence analysis
• Forensic Evidence Analysis

Languages

English