Guglielmo Verdirame is Professor of International Law at the Department of War Studies and the School of Law at King's College London. Before taking on this position, he was a Lecturer at the University of Cambridge and Fellow of the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law. His main areas of research and teaching are public international law, and legal and political philosophy. He is a barrister at 20 Essex Street chambers, London.

• 1. Introduction; 2. Concepts and definitions; 3. Human rights obligations of international organisations; 4. International institutional responsibility; 5. UN relief and development operations; 6. UN peacekeeping; 7. International administrations; 8. Implementation of UN sanctions; 9. Accountability; 10. Conclusions.

'… this book deserves to be highly commended for highlighting an important problem - the lack of accountability of the UN - and systematically looking at the practice of the organisation and the obligations involved.' Tiina Pajuste, British Yearbook of International Law