The European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights (ECCHR)

ECCHR is an independent, non-profit legal and educational organization based in Berlin dedicated to enforcing civil and human rights worldwide. It was founded in 2007 by Wolfgang Kaleck together with other international human rights lawyers, in order to protect and enforce the rights guaranteed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as well as other declarations of human rights and national constitutions, through legal means. Together with affected persons and partners worldwide, ECCHR uses legal means to end impunity of those responsible for grave crimes (international crimes and accountability) corporate exploitation (business and human rights) and fortressed borders (migration). Through its Institute for Legal Intervention, ECCHR’s provides training to the next generations of human rights lawyers and critical reflection on the law. ECCHR stands for lived solidarity across geographical, social and cultural borders. It initiates, develops, and supports high-impact, strategic human rights litigation to hold state and non-state actors accountable for the violations of the rights of the most vulnerable. ECCHR works on cases that illustrate and highlight important legal and social problems, recognizing that human rights violations are committed in specific contexts with a view to achieving certain financial, social, military or political goals. ECCHR’s work seeks to help enforce the rights of those affected by human rights violations, but we also want to expose and highlight structural injustice. We seek justice not just for some of the individuals affected, but for all those who suffer a similar fate. ECCHR works closely together with affected and civil society organizations when developing cases. Together with them, ECCHR identifies problems and risks, develops approaches and strategies aiming at achieving an impact for affected populations in the project, as well as a longer term legal and political impacts on the structural underlying causes to the human rights violations.