Bill Bowring is Professor of Law at Birkbeck College, University of London, where he teaches public international law, human rights and minority rights. He has more than 70 publications: his recent book is “The Degradation of the International Legal Order?” (Routledge, 2008). He is also a practising barrister, and has taken many cases to the Strasbourg Court. In 2003 he founded and is now Chair of the European Human Rights Advocacy Centre (EHRAC). He has frequently worked with OSCE ODIHR, especially in Central Asia, and has served as an expert for OSCE HCNM, for Max van der Stoel and now Knut Vollebaek, in Russia, Ukraine, and Central Asia.