Fergal Gaynor

The prosecutor will, for the first time, be elected in New York by a secret ballot of all 123 states parties to the Rome Statue rather than by consensus.

Mr Gaynor is competing against Karim Khan from the UK, Carlos Castresana from Spain and Francesco Lo Voi from Italy.

A graduate of Cambridge University and Trinity College Dublin who called to the Irish Bar in 2008, Mr Gaynor has over 18 years’ experience in the investigation and prosecution of, and representing victims of, war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide.

His legal career began in 1997 when he was admitted as a trainee solicitor at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer in England. He was hired out of the firm in 2001 to work at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).

He practised as a criminal defence barrister before the Irish courts from October 2008 and August 2009, before being asked to return to the ICTY for the trial of Radovan Karadžić, the so-called “Butcher of Bosnia”.

Last year, he was appointed as reserve international co-prosecutor of the international tribunal set up to try members of the Khmer Rouge for alleged war crimes in Cambodia.