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Zeid Ra'ad Zeid Al-Hussein
Ambassador of the Hashemite Kingdom of
Jordan to the United States of America
 Prince
Zeid is Jordan’s Ambassador to the United States and
non-resident Ambassador to Mexico. He was previously the
kingdom’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations; a post
he held six and a half years (2000-2007). From 1996-2000, he was
Jordan’s Deputy Permanent Representative at the UN, with the
rank of Ambassador.
An expert in the field of international justice, Prince Zeid
played a central role in the establishment of the International
Criminal Court. He chaired, for example, over the course of two
years, the complex, often pioneering, negotiations on the
‘elements’ of the individual offenses falling under the crimes
of: Genocide, Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes. Courts
around the world now cite the definitions for ‘Crimes Against
Humanity’, refined by the ‘elements’, as ‘authoritative’.
In September 2002, Prince Zeid was also elected the first
president of the governing body of the International Criminal
Court, at a time when the Court was only a plan on paper, with
no officials or even an address to its name and, in three years,
oversaw the Court’s growth into the institution it has now
become.
He has also been active on other legal issues. He was the first
of two UN ambassadors to chair the Ad Hoc Committee on the Scope
of Legal Protection under the Convention on the Safety of United
Nations and Associated Personnel. And in the spring of 2004, he
was chosen to be chairman of the ‘Panel of Experts for the UN
Secretary-General’s Trust Fund to Assist States in the
Settlement of Disputes through the International Court of
Justice’, in the matter relating to the boundary dispute between
Benin and Niger. Earlier that year, he was also appointed by his
government as Jordan’s representative, and head of delegation,
before the International Court of Justice in the matter relating
to the wall being built by Israel in the Occupied Palestinian
Territories.
Prince Zeid also served as a political affairs officer in
UNPROFOR in the former Yugoslavia from February 1994 to February
1996, and, having worked intimately with peacekeeping issues for
over the last decade, his knowledge of peacekeeping is
extensive.
Following allegations of widespread abuse being committed by UN
peacekeepers in the summer of 2004, he was appointed as ‘Advisor
to the Secretary-General on Sexual Exploitation and Abuse.’ In
the spring of 2005, he produced a report on this subject;
praised subsequently by international civil society for having
been ‘revolutionary’ in its approach. It provided, for the first
time, a comprehensive strategy for the elimination of Sexual
Exploitation and Abuse in UN Peacekeeping Operations. The report
was endorsed in full, by the 191 Heads of State and Government,
in September 2005.
Prince Zeid also chaired the Consultative Committee for the
United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) and led an
effort to establish greater strategic direction for the Fund
(2004-5007).
Prince Zeid holds a B.A. from The Johns Hopkins University and a
Ph.D. from Cambridge (Christ’s College). On June 14th, 2008,
Prince Zeid was presented with an Honorary Doctorate of Laws by
the Southern California Institute of Law. In 1989, he also
received his commission as an officer in the Jordanian desert
police (the successor to the Arab Legion) and saw service with
them until 1994.
Prince Zeid delivered the Grotius Lecture at the 102nd Annual
Meeting of the American Society of International Law (April
2008).
His publications include: ‘A Nightmare Avoided: Jordan and Suez
1956’ in Israel Affairs (Winter 1994), and ‘Religious Militancy
in the Arab Middle East: Threats and Responses 1979-1988’ in the
Cambridge Review of International Affairs (Spring 1989).
Prince Zeid is a member of the Advisory Committee to the
Institute for Historical Justice and Reconciliation. He is
married to Princess Sarah Zeid, and they have a son and a
daughter. (see shorter biography)
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