Staff Profile

Elena Katselli is Reader of Public International Law at Newcastle Law School which she joined as a lecturer in 2005.

Elena studied Law at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece, where she graduated in 1997. After training and qualifying as a lawyer in Cyprus and becoming member of the Cyprus Bar Council, she worked as an associate in the law firm of Michael Kyprianou & Associates during which time she worked on a number of high profile criminal cases (1997-1998 and 1998-1999). She subsequently embarked into post-graduate studies at the University of Durham obtaining a Master of Laws in International and European Legal Studies (2000) and, after being awarded a full scholarship by the Department of Law, a Doctorate in Public International Law (2005). Her doctoral thesis, under the supervision of Professor Colin Warbrick, was published by Routledge: Francis & Taylor Group (2010) and was re-printed in paper-back format in 2011. The book is entitled The Problem of Enforcement in International Law: Countermeasures, the Non-injured State and the Idea of International Community and was considered for the Paul Guggenheim Prize 2011 awarded by the Instituut de Droit, Geneva.

Before joining Newcastle Law School Elena was offered an internship at the Judges' Chamber of the International Criminal Court in the Hague for the period September 2005 - February 2006. Prior to this she worked as a Tutor in the Law of European Integration (2002-2004) and as a Research Assistant (2000-2001) at the Department of Law, University of Durham.

Since 2005 Elena undertook a number of responsibilities within Newcastle Law School including Director for the European Legal Studies and PGT Marketing Co-ordinator (2014-2015), Degree Programme Director for the Post-graduate Taught Degrees (2010- 2014), Erasmus Student Co-ordinator (2005-2008 and 2014-2015), and academic tutor. Elena is also an active member of the Newcastle Forum for Human Rights and Social Justice which she previously served as Director (May 2007 - October 2008). Elena was also instrumental in the Forum's membership in the Association of Human Rights Institutes (AHRI) in 2010.

Elena has also acted as Chair (2007-2008) and Member of the National Organizing Committee for the Telders International Law Moot Court Competition (2006-2007) (UK National Rounds).

Elena has held a number of various visiting posts. She was invited by Professor Yves Haeck (supported by Professor Dr Johan Vande Lanotte, former Deputy Prime Minister of Belgium) as a Foreign Research Fellow at the Human Rights Centre, Ghent University, Belgium (March - June 2013). She was also a Visiting Professor at the Law School, University of Tuebingen, Germany (July 2011) and a Visiting Scholar at the TC Beirne School of Law / Centre for Public, International and Comparative Law, University of Queensland, Australia (July / August 2010). She has also been a research guest at the Netherlands Institute of Human Rights, Utrecht University (March 2010, January and May 2011).

Elena has acted as referee for research funding proposals for the Arts and Humanities Research Council and for the Research Foundation Flanders. She is also reviewer of book proposals for Routledge and Cambridge University Press. Elena is also a reviewer for the Polish Yearbook of International Law and member of the editorial board of the Inter-American and European Human Rights Journal (Intersentia).

Elena is fluent in Greek and English and has elementary knowledge of French.

Elena's research interests lie in the area of general international law, international human rights and international humanitarian law. Particular research areas on which Elena has published include the law on state responsibility, enforcement of international law through countermeasures, fragmentation of international law, community interests, gross human rights violations, accountability of international organisations, the legal limits of Security Council action, displacement as a result of armed conflict, property rights, joint criminal enterprise for genocide. 

Elena has also a strong interest in the nature and function of international law, responsibility to protect, international mechanisms of protection of the individual particularly within the jurisdiction of the European Court of Human Rights, the law of armed conflict, international criminal law and territorial disputes.

Recently, Elena's article on The Right of Displaced Persons to Property and to Return Home after Demopoulos was published in Human Rights Law Review (2014) 14, 701-32.

Currently, Elena is working on a research project on just satisfaction for serious human rights violations.   

Elena has supervised Doctoral and M.Phil. students in the areas of self-determination (passed viva with no corrections), the use of armed force against non-state actors (passed viva with minor corrections), and the armed conflict in Lebanon. She is currently supervising Doctoral students on responsibility to protect, assisted suicide and the protection of children.

Elena has also supervised an LL.M. dissertation on the prohibition of torture which was published in Human Rights & International Legal Discourse. 

Elena has been invited to present her research works in conferences / workshops / seminars organised by the Association of Human Rights Institutes (2014 & 2011), the International Law Association (British Branch: 2014, 2006 & 2005) and (Belgian Branch: 2007), Human Rights Centre (Gent University: 2013), Law and Conflict at Durham (2012), Institute of Cultural Diplomacy (2011), Amnesty International (2010), Centre for Public, International and Comparative Law, TC Beirne School of Law, University of Queensland, Australia (2010), Exeter Law School (2008), Oxford Brooks University (2008), European Society of International Law (2004), Durham Law School (2004).

Elena has been a recipient of various scholarships / awards / grants for research such as the British Academy Small Research award (2010-12), the HaSS Faculty REF Award (2010) and Durham Law School (full scholarship for Ph.D. studies); for conference organisation / participation by the Modern Law Review (2008) (award given: £3,500), International Law Association (Belgian Branch) (2007) and (British Branch ) (2014, 2006 & 2005), European Society of International Law (2004); for summer course participation by Durham Law School (2002), Institute of International Public Law and International Relations of Thessaloniki (2003 & 2001).

Undergraduate Teaching

Human Rights, Criminal Law.

Postgraduate Teaching

Foundations of Public International Law, International Criminal Law, Contemporary Problems of International Law & International Dispute Settlement.

• Katselli Proukaki E. Forced Displacement, Prevention from Returning and the Jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court. Nordic Journal of International Law 2022, 91(3), 355-389.
• Katselli Proukaki E. Preventing the Forcibly Displaced from Returning as Persecution and Inhumane Act under International Criminal Law and the Rome Statute. International Criminal Law Review 2022, 22, 401-437.
• Bashfield S, Katselli Proukaki E. The Rules-Based Order, International Law and the British Indian Ocean Territory: Do as I Say, Not as I Do. German Law Journal 2022, 23(5), 713-737.
• Katselli E, ed. Armed Conflict and Forcible Displacement: Individual Rights under International Law. Abingdon: Routledge, 2018.
• Katselli E. The Right Not to Be Displaced by Armed Conflict under International Law. In: Katselli E, ed. Armed Conflict and Forcible Displacement Individual Rights under International Law. Abingdon: Routledge, 2018, pp.1-46.
• Katselli E. The Right to Return Home and the Right to Property Restitution under International Law. In: Katselli E, ed. Armed Conflict and Forcible Displacement: Individual Rights under International Law. Abingdon: Routledge, 2018, pp.46-83.
• Tzevelekos V, Katselli E. Migrants at sea: a duty of plural states to protect (extraterritorially)?. Nordic Journal of International Law 2017, 86(4), 427-469.
• Katselli E. ‘Holding the Security Council Accountable for Human Rights Violations’. In: M P Malloy, ed. Economic Sanctions. Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd, 2015. In Preparation.
• Katselli E. Holding the Security Council Accountable for Human Rights Violations. In: Malloy,M, ed. Economic Sanctions. Cheltenham, Glos: Edward Elgar, 2015.
• Katselli E. 'R2P as a Transforming and Transformative Concept in the Context of Responsibility’ as Liability’. In: Barnes, R; Tzevelekos, ed. Beyond Responsibility to Protect: Generating Change in International Law. Intersentia, 2015.
• Katselli Proukaki E. The Right of Displaced Persons to Property and to Return Home after Demopoulos. Human Rights Law Review 2014, 14(4), 701-732.
• Dickinson RA, Katselli-Proukaki E, Murray C, Pedersen O, ed. Examining Critical Perspectives on Human Rights. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
• Katselli E. The Rule of Law and the Role of Human Rights when Peace and Security are under Attack. In: Dickinson, R., Katselli, E., Murray, C., Pedersen, O, ed. Examining Critical Perspectives on Human Rights. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2012, pp.131-152.
• Katselli E. International peace and security, human rights and the courts: a critical re-appraisal. The International Journal of Human Rights 2011, 16(2), 257-277.
• Katselli Proukaki E. The Problem of Enforcement in International Law: Countermeasures, the non-injured state and the idea of international community. Abingdon: Routledge, 2010.
• Katselli E. Countermeasures: Concept and Substance in the Protection of Collective Interests. In: Kaikobad, KH; Bohlander, M, ed. International Law and Power: Perspectives on Legal Order and Justice: Essays in Honour of Colin Warbrick. AD Dordrecht. The Netherlands: Martinus Nijhoff, 2009, pp.401-430.
• Katselli E. Holding the Security Council Accountable for Human Rights Violations. Human Rights and International Legal Discourse 2007, 1(2), 301-333.
• Katselli E. II. The Ankara agreement, Turkey, and the EU. International and Comparative Law Quarterly 2006, 55(3), 705-717.
• Katselli E. Countermeasures by Non-Injured States in the Law on State Responsibility. European Society of International Law, 2005.
• Katselli E, Shah S. September 11 and the UK response. International and Comparative Law Quarterly 2003, 52(1), 245-255.
• Katselli E. The notion of individual criminal responsibility for participation in a joint criminal enterprise in the new international law with respect to the crime of genocide and in view of the new charges for Bosnia against Slobodan Milosevic. In: The New International Criminal Law: 2001 International Law Session. 2003, Sakkoulas Publications.