Tribunals like the one in the Hague deal with crimes of specific conflicts. Do you have an opinion about the United States refusing to sign the treaty establishing the International Criminal Court?
The Allies developed the first international justice tribunals, like Nuremberg. The U.S. is still involved through the U.N. Security Council, which created tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda. These two tribunals advanced modern international law by furthering definitions of crimes against humanity, for example that rape can be a form of genocide. Although the U.S. and other major nations have so far refused to join, there are many countries that have. A permanent international criminal court is one of the more important things we need to make sure these crimes are punished.

Did the outcome of the Milosevic trail have any effect on war-crimes prosecution?
The Milosevic trial proved how difficult it is to prosecute these cases. It’s been criticized for how long it took, and that Milosevic died before the end. There was enormous frustration for the victims of crimes in Bosnia, Kosovo and elsewhere in the region. But the court had to be extremely careful to give the defense (in this case a self-represented defendant) every opportunity. If the tribunal skipped over any safeguards when putting a head of state on trial, it would be criticized. It’s a difficult position.

Does video evidence play a critical role in cases? Can it be easily challenged?
Specific evidence is always open to challenge. In cases like these, video evidence can be incredibly powerful showing the reality of some of these crimes. The video introduced during this particular trial had a huge impact when it was shown on Serbian television, because many people in Serbia did not believe that those crimes had been committed. It was a deciding factor in changing Serbian public opinion.

The U.S. left itself open to prosecution with its recent disregard for the Geneva Conventions. Do you think we'll see anyone from this administration in the Hague defending the U.S. government's behavior?
Finding a court that has jurisdiction over the U.S. is going to be tricky, but there’s certainly a trend we’re seeing that it’s harder and harder to escape accountability, as you see the political reality of who can actually be brought to trial. Certainly I think many countries have now seen that people who thought that they were completely invincible from prosecution have turned out not to be. It’s often a matter of time.

What drew you to this line of work anyway?
Once you’ve done one crimes-against-humanity case, you can’t go back to normal law.

Milosevic on Trial screens at the Tribeca Film Festival 2008.