“International law is humanity’s last line of defence,” said Navi Pillay calling out government impunity in accepting the Sydney Peace Prize speech last night. Stephanie Tran reports.
Former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Judge Navi Pillay has used her acceptance of the 2025 Sydney Peace Prize to issue a pointed reminder that “no one is above accountability,” warning that governments cannot claim ignorance in the face of atrocities unfolding in Gaza and elsewhere.
Pillay, who chaired the UN Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, told a packed audience at Sydney Town Hall on Thursday night that governments must apply the same standards of law to themselves that they demand of their citizens.
“Much more should be done … if governments are not complying with the law, how can they ask citizens to comply with the law?” she said.
A trailblazer in international law, Pillay’s career spans South Africa’s transition from apartheid to democracy, where she became the first non-white woman appointed to the High Court. She later served as a judge on the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, the International Criminal Court, and as the UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights from 2008 to 2014.
Reflecting on her early years as a lawyer defending political prisoners under apartheid, Pillay described how the law could be reclaimed as a tool against injustice.
“The law, as it was written, protected the apartheid, but I believed that law could also be a tool to fight injustice from within,” she said. “Practising law under apartheid was an education in courage. It taught me that injustice is not abstract; it has a human face. It is a mother waiting outside a prison gate, a child denied schooling, the man whose confession was beaten out of him.”
Pillay underscored the importance of persistence and courage in the face of injustice.
“Throughout my career I have been asked how I kept going in the face of such horror, such resistance and such politics,” Pillay said. “My answer is simple: I drew strength from the people whose rights we defend. It is not about despair. It is about persistence. We do not have the luxury of giving up, because injustice never takes a day off.”
Accountability essential for justice in Gaza
In his opening address of the ceremony, Mohamed Duar, deputy chair of the Sydney Peace Foundation and Amnesty International Australia’s spokesperson on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, said
international law was “humanity’s last line of defence”
and justice would only be served when the perpetrators of the human rights violations in Gaza are held to account.
“Those responsible for the atrocities, war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide must be held to account and face trial regardless of who they are,” he said. “International justice demands accountability for these crimes, prevents future atrocities, and provides a path for victims to seek justice and reparations.”
Chris Sidoti, a former Australian Human Rights Commissioner who served alongside Pillay as Commissioner on the UN Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory criticised the lack of accountability for human rights abuses perpetrated by Israeli forces in President Trump’s 20-point “peace plan”.
“The 20-point peace thought bubble only contains one reference to accountability, and that is to provide an amnesty for Hamas. It says nothing about Israeli accountability,” Sidoti said. “There can be no peace without accountability. There can be no justice without accountability. … Without accountability we are destined to repeat the history of human rights atrocities”.
Executive director of the Australian Centre for International Justice, Rawan Arraf said the impunity of Israel for the ongoing atrocities in Gaza exposed a global failure of political will to uphold international law.
“What we’re up against here is the unwillingness of authorities to actually implement the obligations that they have,” Arraf said. “When there is an absence of accountability, the cycle continues. … Israel has now committed a genocide because of the absence of accountability and impunity reigning.”
Stephanie is a journalist with a passion for uncovering stories that hold power to account. With a background in both law and journalism, she has worked at The Guardian and as a paralegal, where she assisted Crikey’s defence team in the high-profile defamation case brought by Lachlan Murdoch. Her reporting has been recognised nationally, earning her the 2021 Democracy’s Watchdogs Award for Student Investigative Reporting and a nomination for the 2021 Walkley Student Journalist of the Year Award.