Following Augusto Pinochet's arrest in London in 1998, his team approached British lawyer Philippe Sands. They wanted him to represent the Chilean dictator. "I would have done it, but my wife said she would divorce me if I did the case," Sands tells the English Language Broadcast. Instead, he ended up representing Human Rights Watch in the case against Pinochet. Last year, he published 38 London Street, a book in which he delves into the crimes of Pinochet's regime and the dictator's connection with a Nazi official who secretly lived in Chile.
An expert in international law, Philippe Sands has appeared as counsel before international courts in many other significant cases, notably representing Mauritius in the sovereignty dispute over the Chagos Archipelago and Gambia in the ongoing genocide case against Myanmar. As an author, he has written about the Nuremberg trials, and he is currently working on a book about the killing of Ukrainian novelist Victoria Amelina in a Russian attack.
We had the chance to discuss all this and more with Sands during his latest visit to Madrid, where he also reflected on the lack of accountability for the crimes of Franco's dictatorship in Spain. We also talked about Gaza, the definition of genocide, and Donald Trump's disregard for international law. "International law has always been a long game. Mr Trump can express the desire to tear up the rules, but I suspect that, in the long term, the rules of international law will outlive Mr Trump," Sands assures.
