The Secretary General and co-founder of ECCHR, a lawyer specializing in criminal law, has established an international reputation as an advocate for human rights. He made a name for himself when he filed suit against the U.S. Defense Minister Donald Rumsfeld for war crimes and torture committed at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay.

After completing his law degree in Bonn in 1990, Kaleck served as a legal intern  at the Comission de Derechos Humanos de Guatemala.  After founding the law firm Kaleck.Hummel.Rechtsanwälte in 1991, he worked as a specialist solicitor in criminal law. Since 1998 he has been an advocate for the Koalition der Straflosigkeit, which fights to hold Argentinean military officials accountable for the murder and disappearance of Germans during the Argentine dictatorship.

Mr Kaleck is a highly sought after specialist, and an active publicist on human rights subjects. He is member of the council of the Centre of European Law and Politics at the University of Bremen (ZERP).

The former chairman of the Republican Women Lawyers and Attorneys Association (RAV) and former Vice President of the European Democratic Lawyers (DFA), Kaleck is highly sought after human rights expert. He is a member of the Advisory Council at the Center for European Legal Policy at the University of Bremen (ZERP).

Miriam Saage-Maaß is a program director at ECCHR and coordinates the business and Human Rights program. She studied law at Humboldt University in Berlin and has a Ph.D. from Johann Wolfgang von Goethe University, Frankfurt in Constitutional History.

Albert Koncsek studied Political Sciences, History and Philosophy in Trier and Budapest. For twelve years Koncsek worked as executive director at the National Self-government of the German Minority in Budapest. He has been Operations Manager at ECCHR since November 2008.

Claudia Muller-Hoff, LL.M., worked in the legal education department in Mainz, Freiburg, Frankfurt Oder and in Glasgow, Scotland. She specialized in International Law at Warwick, England, and advocated on behalf of refugees and migrants in Germany. Her most recent position was as a human rights defense lawyer in Latin America. She works for ECCHR as project coordinator for our Business and Human Rights departments.

Ben Hayes has worked for the civil liberties organization Statewatch, London, since 1996. He specializes in EU Justice and Home Affairs Law. Hayes also works with the Transnational Institute inAmsterdam, and has been retained as a consultant for a number of international human rights, social justice and development organizations. He has a PhD from Magee College, Derry/Londonderry, and currently works as a Legal Analyst with the ECCHR, assisting in the Counterterrorism and Human Rights program.

Gavin is a solicitor from the United Kingdom and Australia with a background in public law, human rights and public interest litigation. Prior to joining ECCHR, he worked as a litigator challenging UK state authorities with Leigh Day & Co (London) and Public Interest Lawyers (Birmingham) on cases engaging human rights (domestic and international) and international humanitarian law issues. He also taught public law at Birkbeck College, University of London. Gavin is the program manager to ECCHR´s Counterterrorism and Human Rights program.

Anna v. Gall received her legal education in Göttingen, Hamburg, Berlin and Kiew, and she specializes in Immigration Law, International Relations and in the field of Human Rights. She has worked in Namibia, Brüssels and most recently in Georgia. She is a member of the Coordination Committee Against Impunity of Amnesty International in Germany. For the ECCHR Gall coordinates our Gender and Human Rights Program.

Andreas Schüller graduated from law school in Trier, Germany, and holds a LL.M. advanced degree from Leiden University, Netherlands, in Public International Law. He specialized in International Criminal Law.  Schüller is a member of Amnesty International Germany Working Group on International Justice. Andreas is program manager of the ECCHR Universal Justice program.

After studying Law and International Relations in Madrid, which she supplemented with a Masters in International Cooperation, Sánchez de Molina worked in Spain as a lawyer in the areas of immigration and refugee law and employment law, and was on staff the European Court in Luxembourg. For ECCHR she is active in our Universal Justice program.

Sylwia Plaza studied Law at the University of Leipzig and holds an LLM in International Human Rights Law from the University of Essex. Her main interests are business and human rights and, having participated in the Concours Pictet, humanitarian law and the law of war. She is currently completing her legal training in Berlin and working part-time at the ECCHR as an administrative assistant.