From 30 June to 4 July 2025, the Faculty of Law at Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice hosted a summer school for students and graduates of faculties of law, focused on issues of international humanitarian law and international human rights law.
The summer school was organized by representatives of the Institute of International and European Law: JUDr. Ľudmila Elbert, PhD., univ.doc., Mgr. Ľubica Gregová Širicová, PhD., and Mgr. Laura Gazdagová. The summer school was preceded by several months of preparation aimed at connecting experts in the relevant fields of international law from several countries. As a result, the event welcomed lecturers and students not only from Slovakia, but also from Hungary, Poland, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, and Italy. Participants attended 19 lectures and an accompanying program conducted in English.
The lecturers presented current topics focusing on various types of armed conflicts and the reasons behind their emergence, accountability for crimes under international law, the relationship between international humanitarian law and international human rights law, different forms of assistance for victims of armed conflicts, including stateless persons, the role of humanitarian organizations involved, questions of compensation for damage caused by armed conflict, and many other related issues.
A detailed program is available on the summer school website:
https://www.upjs.sk/app/uploads/sites/11/2025/05/Summer-school-of-IHRL-and-HRL-program.pdf
The program also included opportunities for strengthening social ties through a pub quiz and a guided tour of Košice. We would also like to extend our sincere thanks to the Constitutional Court of the Slovak Republic for their attendance and the presentation of their activities related to international law.
We thank all participating lecturers and students for their active engagement and the positive feedback received already during the course of the summer school. We believe that this initiative contributed to strengthening the internationalization activities of Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice within the framework of the project Audit of the level of internationalisation and implementation of internationalisation projects of higher education institutions and research institutions, project code: K10-I4-48, Objective 21: Supporting the internationalisation of education at the Faculty of Law, Activity 21.1: Organising a summer school.
We look forward to further professional opportunities for meetings focused on current issues of international law.
