Nadine El Dekmak

Nadine El-Dekmak holds a master’s degree in Law from the Lebanese University (LBN). After graduating, she took on her first internship at the Special Tribunal For Lebanon (STL,The Hague). In the Hague, she interned in the Defense Office of the STL as her main tasks focused on conducting research on both International Criminal Law and Lebanese Criminal Law.

Since 2020, Nadine took the pledge before the court of Appeal in Beirut and joined the Beirut Bar Association as a trainee lawyer.

In addition to the Lebanese master’s degree, in 2022 she got her L.L.M degree in International and European Law from the Brussels School of Governance – Institute of European Studies at the Vrije Universiteit of Brussels. She wrote her dissertation on the Kafala system (sponsorship system) and the international standards of migrant workers. Her work sought to analyze whether the sponsorship system, under which migrant domestic workers are recruited, breaches human rights instruments and international standards of migrant workers.

In September 2022, Nadine became a PhD candidate at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. Her research focuses on Human Trafficking and migrant workers. She also joined the Fundamental Rights Research Centre (FRC) at the VUB, to provide research assistance on the HEROES project (Novel Strategies to Fight Child Sexual Exploitation and Human Trafficking Crimes and Protect their Victims).

Research Expertise: Human trafficking, labour exploitation, labour migration, slavery, child sexual abuse/exploitation, human rights.

Research Methodology: qualitative, doctrinal and empirical.