Zegveld was born in
Ridderkerk and grew up in
Dirksland on the island of
Goeree-Overflakkee in
South Holland, the Netherlands. After her law studies at
Utrecht University she obtained a doctoral degree
cum laude in 2000. She received several awards for her doctoral thesis
Accountability of Armed Opposition Groups in International Law. In 2000, she was sworn in as a lawyer; and in 2005, she became a partner at
Prakken d'Oliveira Human Rights Lawyers. At this law firm, Zegveld heads the
international law and
human rights department, where her cases mainly focus on liability for violations of human rights and compensation for victims of war. Between 2006 and 2013, Zegveld was a professor at
Leiden University, where she lectured on
international humanitarian law, in particular on the rights of women and children during armed conflict. She has been professor of
war reparations at the
University of Amsterdam since the end of 2013. Liesbeth Zegveld is a member of the Dutch
Human Rights Watch committee and former member of the Committee on Reparation for Victims of Armed Conflict within the
International Law Association and a member of the Netherlands Society for International Law.
Notable cases Zegveld is well known for her work on the Srebrenica case of the
Bosnian genocide, where she represented the relatives of two victims of the
Srebrenica massacre in July 1995. Before the Dutch courts, Zegveld asserted that
Dutchbat – the Dutch battalion of the
United Nations Protection Force that was responsible for the protection of the
Srebrenica enclave – and the Dutch government knowingly exposed
Bosnian Muslims to the enemy
Bosnian Serb Army. In 2013, the
Dutch Supreme Court accepted the claim. In 2011, Zegveld represented seven widows and two others in a case filed by the
Dutch Honorary Debts Committee Foundation against the Dutch state for its involvement in the
Rawagede massacre of 9 December 1947, during which 431 Indonesian villagers were killed by the
Royal Netherlands East Indies Army. Following a judgment by the Court of The Hague, the state decided to settle the matter, publicly apologising for its involvement and paying €20,000 in compensation to each still living stakeholder. In 2011 and 2013, Zegveld represented family members of victims of the
1976–81 military regime of
Jorge Rafael Videla in
Argentina, who reported
Jorge Zorreguieta – the father of
Queen Máxima of the Netherlands – to the Public Prosecution Service for his role in the regime. Zegveld also represented the victims of
Iraqi chemical attacks against Iran during the
Iran–Iraq War of 1980–88 in a case against
Frans van Anraat, a Dutch businessman who sold materials to produce chemical weapons to the Iraqi regime during the war. All victims were granted €25,000 in damages. Another high-profile case was that of Azhar Sabah Jaloud, who was fatally shot at a Dutch military checkpoint on 24 April 2007 during the
Iraq War. On behalf of the young man's father, Zegveld started a case against the Dutch state, which resulted in a successful complaint against the Netherlands before the
European Court of Human Rights. On behalf of the
Federation of Dutch Trade Unions and a
Bangladeshi migrant worker, Zegveld held the
FIFA accountable for the mistreatment of
migrant workers who prepare the
2022 World Cup in
Qatar. Zegveld represented the families of two
Moluccan perpetrators of the
1977 Dutch train hijacking in a case against the Dutch government. In July 2018, the Court of The Hague dismissed the case, concluding that the Dutch state had not taken unlawful action in ending the hostage crisis. In 2018, Zegveld and her client
Salo Muller persuaded the Dutch state-owned rail operator
Nederlandse Spoorwegen to pay compensation to
Holocaust survivors and relatives of those transported by Dutch rail to
Nazi concentration camps during
World War II. ==Bibliography==