When growing up, Magda Karagiannakis dreamed of modelling herself on strong characters like spy James Bond and lawyer Atticus Finch.
After years of working in The Hague prosecuting war criminals and investigating terrorism in the Middle East for the UN, the comparison now is actually pretty apt.

You really understand that when you meet this bright and charming woman in person. She pulls you in with her charm and humour and keeps you engrossed with her stories of international intrigue and justice.

Magda’s resume reads like a lawyer’s dream. She’s successfully prosecuted and convicted General Radislav Krsti´c, for the Srebrenica genocide, becoming the first conviction for genocide in Europe.

She’s swapped sides and defended war criminal and former President of Liberia, Charles Taylor, for his part in the Sierra Leone conflict by representing the State for failing to prevent genocide.

And she’s lived in what she describes as a real life thriller movie when she was a senior legal advisor to the UN inquiry over political assassinations in Lebanon.

“In a movie it just looks like fun, but all these types of war crimes prosecutions and terrorism investigations are very serious subjects that involve people’s lives; it’s deadly serious in real life,” she tells Neos Kosmos.

“It can be much more disturbing and petrifying than you see in the movies.”

Such a life was not something Magda automatically expected from her humble beginnings.

Growing up in a Greek household in suburban Melbourne, Magda says she owes her initial interest in justice and international affairs to her well informed parents.

“Although my parents weren’t formally educated they were really well read and had a keen interest in current affairs,” she tells Neos Kosmos.
“I remember watching 60 Minutes with them every Sunday night.”

She says there was nothing better than sitting at the dinner table and having vigorous debates with her parents.

Without her realising it, she was being trained as a lawyer even before she was hit law school.

Starting out with an undergraduate law degree, Magda soon realised her interests were in two fields, commercial law and international law.

Her time at a Melbourne law firm practicing commercial law was a good start, but she soon realised international law was where her passion was.
“I didn’t expect to fall in love with any law, but international law really did pique my interest,” she says.

Unfortunately, Australia doesn’t have many job options for an international lawyer, so Magda quickly set her sights on The Hague and New York, headquarters of the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court and the UN.

“I knew that if I wanted to practice I had to go to The Hague,” she says.

Deciding to follow on and get further qualified for the field, she took on a master’s degree in international law at Leiden University, which is only a short distance from The Hague.

In her late 20s and with her master’s degree in hand, she set up shop in a local Dutch law firm which practised international law. Her experience and connections at the firm catapulted her into the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, and gave her a career defining case.

It was Melbourne’s Magda Karagiannakis (and the whole team of prosecutors) against Bosnian war criminal Radislav Krsti´c.

“You’ll never forget your first big case, it has the most impact on you,” Magda says.

“I was so young, just in my late 20s, I just thought this was an amazing opportunity and I didn’t know what it entailed when I got into it.”

The man she would later prosecute had a major part in the killing of more than 8,000 and the expulsion of more than 25,000 Muslim Bosnians.

Krsti´c was charged with genocide and crimes against humanity.

Witthe first successful prosecution for genocide in Europe by an international criminal courth the help of Magda and the prosecution team, Krsti´c is now serving a 35-year sentence.

Magda believes these precedents represent huge steps forward for the victims and holding political and military leaders accountable for civilian atrocities. Failure to prevent or punish genocide is just as bad as the crime itself.

“No court ruling can bring back the dead, but such prosecutions and punishments can deter leaders in the future,” she says.

When defending and prosecuting people who have committed unthinkable atrocities the biggest challenge is remaining impartial. But for an international lawyer up against or defending the names we’ve come to know in the media for all the wrong reasons, impartiality is without question one of the most important skills to have.

“This is the job of every lawyer, to know the difference between your professional role and your personal views,” Magda says.

“What would you think about a doctor that asks ‘have you been a good person?’ before they treated you?”

“A doctor’s job isn’t to judge you before they help you professionally and the lawyer’s job isn’t to judge you either, that’s the judge’s job or the jury’s job. What is important is a fair trial.”

With a mountain of legal knowledge, getting her view on current affairs topics will have you forget the politicised coverage and look at the facts.
Asking her for a view on the way Australia is treating its refugees, you get a clear idea how a government signed to the UN Refugee Convention should be handling these situations.

“I think what’s happening on Manus island is shameful,” she says.

“We have an obligation to treat people humanely, and the question is: are we fulfilling our obligations to keep and process their claims consistently with our obligations to the UN Refugee Convention?

“Australia says they are in charge of those facilities, but letting in police forces from another third party state is definitely problematic in the context of us fulfilling our obligations.”

That legal knowledge is a huge commodity in any industry, but now after many years in the field, Magda has decided to pass on her knowledge to the next generation and hopefully inspire many more Australians to take up work as international barristers.

You’ll now find Madga lecturing at La Trobe University, and even though she might not be prosecuting war criminals right now, she’s still in her element in front of a lecture hall.

“I was never exposed to anyone at university who was able to tell me any of the things I can tell my students,” she says.
“So I thought why shouldn’t I pass it on?”

Her teaching units in mental disorder and criminal law and international advocacy pack out lecture halls and will surely make hundreds of students consider specialising in international law or criminal law above more popular streams.

She is a living role model to her students and must inspire female students who are apprehensive about entering a male dominated field.
“It’s important for female professionals to be liked, but it’s even more important to be respected,” she says.

“My advice to the female students is do not try to be one of the boys.

“We must be excellent at what we do so that we give others no choice but to consider us for the best positions.”

Magda balances her life in academia with international work, as she’s still constantly called up for consulting work.
Wherever there is a need for international justice, Magda will be there.