How is international criminal evidence collected, presented and evaluated across different institutions and proceedings — and what legal, practical and methodological challenges arise in that process?

The workshop, held on Tuesday, September 8, 2026, was organised in preparation for the forthcoming Elgar Research Handbook on International Criminal Evidence. Across four thematic panels, the contributors discussed contemporary questions concerning the use of evidence in domestic and international proceedings, witness protection and procedural fairness, concepts and methods of international criminal evidence, and emerging actors and technologies in international fact-finding. Each contribution was followed by an in-depth discussion, allowing the authors to receive feedback on their chapters ahead of publication.

Stavrou presented her chapter, “The Right to a Fair Trial and its Implications for International Criminal Evidence”. She examined the close interrelationship between fair trial guarantees and evidentiary decision-making in international criminal proceedings. Drawing on the jurisprudence of the International Criminal Court and the ad hoc international criminal tribunals, she argued that the right to a fair trial is not external to evidence law, but an essential part of it. Fair trial considerations should therefore guide the disclosure, admissibility, exclusion and evaluation of evidence. Particular attention was given to the potential tensions between defendants’ rights and evidentiary practices such as the submission approach, under which determinations on the admissibility of evidence may be deferred until the final deliberations.

The workshop provided an opportunity for detailed exchange on the individual chapters and on the broader challenges confronting international criminal evidence in practice.