About IHRC: Our Story

Why Choose International Human Rights?

From war crimes and genocide to human trafficking and crimes against humanity, human rights violations are some of the most urgent and devastating issues facing our global society. By engaging in this high-impact field and learning to apply international law as a tool for social justice, you can make a real difference in the world.

Since the clinic’s launch in 2011, students have achieved a near 100 percent success rate in representing human trafficking victims of forced labor and commercial sex as well as women human rights defenders seeking asylum and refugees seeking resettlement. The work is international, with clients from Cameroon, El Salvador, Ethiopia, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, Peru, the Philippines, Syria, and Uganda.

Students have assisted international judges and legal officers by reviewing briefings, conducting research, and drafting extensive bench memoranda and opinions in international trials. Efforts involve 15 former heads-of-state and high-level military leaders allegedly responsible for war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and terrorism perpetrated against hundreds of thousands of victims in Cambodia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lebanon and Rwanda. The trials have resulted in a number of convictions.

Types of Cases

Clinic students practice in four main areas:

• International Criminal Justice & Accountability
• Refugee Rights
• Anti-Human Trafficking Work
• Fair Trial Rights

The Clinic has played a pivotal role in projects including:

• Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, assisting judges by researching international criminal law and drafting bench memos/sections related to crimes against humanity
• drafting a petition before the Inter-American Commission on behalf of refugees fleeing gang violence in Latin America
• research for drafting a complaint under the Alien Tort Statute on behalf of war amputees from Sierra Leone
• representing survivors of human trafficking from Asia, Latin America and Africa in obtaining visas, reunification with family members after several years in captivity, work permits, legal residency and benefits, as well as in facilitating their cooperation with law enforcement against their traffickers
• helping affirmative asylum seekers from Africa who are applying for refugee status

Students have assisted with cases being litigated in the U.S. Supreme Court, California Supreme Court, the International Criminal Court, Inter-American Human Rights Commission, International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, Special Tribunal for Lebanon and the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia.

Each student works on approximately one to three cases or projects per year.

Selection Process

First- and second-year JD students are invited to apply in the spring for the following academic year. Because of the hands-on nature of the clinic, enrollment is limited to eight students per year with a limited number able to enroll in an advanced clinical component the following year. Selection is interview-based.

Academic Credit

The clinic is offered as a course within the JD curriculum and, if selected, you will receive academic credit. Students enroll in the clinical course for one year with the potential for a second year in the advanced clinic.

Through the clinic, you will not only learn the substantive law but also gain skills in international lawyering and human rights advocacy.

First- and second-year JD students are invited to apply in the spring for the following academic year. Because of the hands-on nature of the clinic, enrollment is limited to eight students per year with a limited number able to enroll in an advanced clinical component the following year. Selection is interview-based.

Learning Outcomes

You will have the opportunity to develop crucial skills through firsthand experience, including:

• knowledge of international law and its application in international and domestic jurisdictions
• international legal research, writing and analysis
• developing case-specific theories
• fact-finding
• drafting of legal briefs, factual declarations, bench memoranda and judicial opinions
• in-depth interviewing, with active listening and effective questioning
• cross-cultural lawyering and working with interpreters
• working with survivors of trauma
• effective communication with clients and partner organizations
• teamwork
• educational, legislative and media advocacy

Clinic Director

Henna Pithia is Interim Director of the International Human Rights Clinic. Since joining the clinic in September 2021, Pithia has led students as they engage in human rights work around accountability for mass atrocities in Cameroon, trial monitoring in collaboration with the Clooney Foundation for Justice’s TrialWatch initiative in Morocco and Kyrgyzstan, and individual client representation work for asylum seekers, trafficking survivors, and others fleeing harm or persecution. In February 2023, Pithia was the primary author of Best Practices and Resources for Representing Operation Allies Welcome Parolees and Afghan Nationals, a guide aimed at increasing legal representation for the many Afghan refugees and asylum seekers that are currently in the United States or seeking entry to the United States. Pithia has also led IHRC students on other projects including a fact-finding and data gathering project in Malawi focused on incarcerated women who have experienced gender-based violence, as well as assisting Afghan refugees and asylum seekers in Fremont, California, home to one of the largest Afghan communities in the United States.

Prior to serving as Interim Director and Co-Director of the IHRC, Pithia served as an Asylum Officer with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, conducting hundreds of in-depth interviews in California and near the U.S.-Mexico border, and making complex decisions that changed people’s lives forever. Pithia also served as the IHRC’s first Legal Fellow after she graduated from USC Gould. As a Legal Fellow, she helped teach the IHRC’s weekly seminar and focused much of her time on refugee rights, anti-human trafficking work, and advocacy efforts around accountability for human rights violations. Pithia has also spent time in Canada and the U.S. working with law firms focused on business immigration and global mobility.

Clinic Founding Director

Hannah Garry, the executive director of the UCLA Promise Institute for Human Rights, served as the founding director of the International Human Rights Clinic when it first opened at USC Gould School of Law in 2011 until the summer of 2023. She has devoted herself to international human rights issues since 1994, working with organizations including Oxford University’s Refugee Studies Centre, the International Criminal Court, United Nations International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the European Court of Human Rights and what is now Global Rights. At the University of Colorado School of Law, she supervised students on cases involving Guantanamo detainee representation and Alien Tort Statute litigation. Prof. Garry holds a JD from the University of California, Berkeley, a master’s in International Affairs from Columbia University and a master’s certificate in Forced Migration Studies with distinction from Oxford University.