Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh KC

Contact Blinne: blinnenighralaigh@matrixlaw.co.uk | +44 (0)20 7404 3447

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Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh is a leading expert in human rights, crime and international law.

She is described in the legal directories as “one of the leading silks in her generation”, a “fiercely intelligent” and “extraordinarily talented lawyer”, and “compelling” and “persuasive” advocate, who is “tactically brilliant”, “quick to spot winning points in a case”, and “utterly committed” to her clients.

Blinne is recognised in the legal directories as a leading lawyer in eight distinct practice areas: public international law, international human rights law, civil liberties / human rights, protest law, administrative / public law, criminal law, international criminal law, and inquests / inquiries. She is also recognised as a “global leader” in public international law in the Chambers Global legal directory.

Blinne was named Lawyer of the Year by the Irish Women’s Lawyers’ Association in 2025. She was nominated for the awards of Human Rights and Public Law Silk of the Year and International Law Silk of the Year in the 2025 Chambers & Partners Awards and 2024 Legal 500 Bar Awards respectively. In 2022, she was named the Legal 500 International Law Junior of the Year and was the “commended” Barrister of the Year in the Lawyer Awards. She was a finalist in the 2021 LALY Barrister of the Year awards, and was nominated for Crime Junior of the year in the 2021 Chambers & Partners awards and the 2020 Legal 500 awards, respectively.

Blinne has an extensive practice, acting for and advising individuals, States, NGOs and other bodies, in domestic and international courts and tribunals. She is called to the Bars of England and Wales, and Ireland, North and South, and is on the International Criminal Court’s List of Counsel. She has been appointed Adjunct Professor at University College Cork, University College Dublin and the University of Galway.

Public International Law

Blinne is recognised in public international law as being “simply superb” – “one of the best speakers that the ICJ has ever seen”. The legal directories highlight her “impressive academic credentials” and “brilliant mind”, describing her “depth of knowledge… on tactics, procedure and the substantive issues of the case, both legal and factual [a]s frankly staggering”.

Blinne’s practice covers the full spectrum of public international law. She acts and advises extensively on international law matters, including international humanitarian law and the law of armed conflict, international human rights law, genocide, environmental law, State and personal immunities, maritime and territorial boundary delimitations, the arms trade and arms proliferation, and the law of the sea. She has particular experience in treaty drafting.

Blinne acts and appears for States, international organisations, NGOs and individuals, before both domestic and international courts and tribunals, including the International Court of Justice. She also acts as amicus in cases in foreign national jurisdictions raising matters of international law, and before the Privy Council in appeals from Commonwealth countries.

She is also expert in drafting submissions to United Nations bodies and special procedures on behalf of individuals and NGOs.

Blinne’s cases include:

• Obligations of Israel in relation to the Presence and Activities of the United Nations, Other International Organizations and Third States in and in relation to the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Advisory Proceedings: counsel and advocate for the State of Palestine in advisory proceedings heard before the International Court of Justice in April-May 2025.
• Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in the Gaza Strip (South Africa v. Israel) counsel and advocate for South Africa in its applications for provisional measures against Israel before the International Court of Justice for breach of the Genocide Convention in relation to Israel’s military attacks on and starvation of Gaza.
• Application of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (Croatia v. Serbia): counsel and advocate for Croatia in its claim before the International Court of Justice for breach of the Genocide Convention, with Professors James Crawford SC and others.
• Application of the Interim Accord of 13 September 1995 (the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia v. Greece): counsel for the Republic of Macedonia in its successful claim before the International Court of Justice against Greece for breach of the 1995 treaty.
• ARA Libertad Arbitration (Argentina v. Ghana): counsel in arbitral proceedings pursuant to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea concerning the compliance with international law principles of immunity of the seizure by Ghana of an Argentinian war ship.
• Maritime Boundary Delimitation Arbitration (Guyana v. Suriname): co-counsel for Guyana in arbitral proceedings brought pursuant to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (“UNCLOS”).
• Kiobel v. Royal Dutch Petroleum (extraterritorial application): intervener in support of the Plaintiff’s appeal before the United States’ Supreme Court concerning the liability of oil-exploration companies for aiding and abetting violations of customary international law by the Nigerian government.

Blinne’s advisory work (in the public domain) includes:

• Legal advice on the legality under international humanitarian and human rights law of arms exports by the United Kingdom to Saudi Arabia for use in Yemen.
• Legal advice on the compliance of Israeli military courts in the occupied Palestinian Territory with applicable rules of international humanitarian and human rights law, and implications for third states on the recognition of convictions of Palestinian civilians and/or of terms of administrative detention without trial.
• Advising the (then) Republic of Macedonia in treaty negotiations with Greece regarding the name of the State and its accession to regional and international organisations; treaty drafting.
• Legal advice on personal immunities provided to high profile individuals subject to Interpol Red Notices, leading to their cancellation.

Public Law and Human Rights

Blinne practices at the intersection of public law, human rights and international law.

She is recognised in the legal directories in this field as an “an outstanding human rights lawyer” who is “fiercely intelligent”, “will know a case inside and out”, and “always goes the extra mile for her client” combining “excellent advocacy”, and “a strong sense of justice” with a “great understanding of public law and how to best use it to her client’s advantage”.

She has a particular specialism in cases involving violations (including historic violations) of fundamental rights by State agents and institutions, including the right to life, the prohibition on torture, and the right to a fair trial. She has appeared in seminal Troubles-related cases, including leading Supreme Court appeals, including on behalf of the Hooded Men, concerning the retroactivity of the Human Rights Act 1998.

Blinne is also a leading free-speech expert, having acted in many of the most high-profile and precedent-setting cases involving the rights to freedom of conscience, expression and protest, engaging Articles 9, 10 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Cases include:

• Ammori v. Secretary of State for the Home Department: counsel for one of the founders of Palestine Action in her successful challenge to the proscription of the protest group as a terrorist organisation.
• Al-Haq v Secretary of State for Business and Trade: counsel for Palestinian NGO Al-Haq in its challenge to the legality of the continuing export by Britain of weapons, including F-35 components, to Israel in the context of Israel’s large scale military assault on Gaza.
• Irish Headstone Case [2021] EACC 1: counsel for Conradh na Gaeilge, intervening in the successful appeal brought by the Keane family in the Court of Arches against a discriminatory ruling by the Chancellor of the Diocese of Coventry, prohibiting them from inscribing the Irish epitaph “inár gcroíthe go deo”, untranslated, on their mother’s headstone.
• In Re McGuigan [2019] NICA 46, [2021] NI 15:appeal brought by the ‘Hooded Men’ in order to secure an investigation into British ministerial authorisation of their ill-treatment and torture in violation of Article 3 ECHR, including the infliction on them of the five techniques of ‘deep interrogation’ (hooding, stress position, sleep deprivation, deprivation of food and water, and subjection to noise) during their internment without trial in the North of Ireland in the early 1970s.
• In Re McQuillan [2021] UKSC 55, [2022] AC 1063: successful appeal by the family of Jean Smyth-Campbell, a young mother shot dead in Belfast in 1974, challenging the failure by the PSNI properly and independently to investigate the circumstances of her killing, in violation of Article 2 ECHR.
• R (Campaign against the Arms Trade) v. Secretary of State for Business [2017] EWHC 1726 (QB): intervened on behalf of Oxfam in this seminal challenge to the British Government’s continuing export of weapons to Saudi Arabia for use against Yemen.
• INEOS v. Persons Unknown [2019] EWCA Civ 515, [2019] 4 WLR 100: successful challenge to the grant of an unprecedented, wide-ranging injunction to a fracking company, attempting to restrain anti-fracking protests at multiple sites across Britain.
• Coagh Inquest [2024] NICoroner 22:represented the next of kin of Tony Doris, at an inquest into the circumstances of his killing by the SAS in an ambush in Coagh, Co. Tyrone, in 1991.
• JM (TPIM [2017] EWHC 1529 (Admin): challenge to the Secretary of State’s imposition against an individual of a notice under the Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures Act 2011.
• Undercover Policing Inquiry: acted for individuals and organisations targeted by British undercover police officers for their activism around campaigns for peace, anti-racism, Palestine, weapons, the Iraq War, anti-capitalism, animal rights and fox hunting.

Protest Law

Blinne is described in the legal directories as the “doyenne of protest law”. She is a leading expert in the rights to freedom of conscience and belief, freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, guaranteed under Articles 9, 10 and 11 ECHR, acting in a broad spectrum of criminal trials, injunction proceedings, civil actions and public inquiries. The directories highlight her “encyclopaedic knowledge of the law”, stating that “[n]o one can come anywhere close to her on protests”.

Blinne has appeared in the most high-profile and precedent-setting protest and free speech cases of recent years, including the trials of the Colston slaver statue topplers and of the “Stansted 15”, acquitted on appeal for having blocked a deportation flight from taking off from Stansted Airport. She was also instructed in the two seminal Supreme Court cases concerning the approach to Articles 10 and 11 ECHR in a protest context.

Cases include:

• Ammori v. Secretary of State for the Home Department: counsel for one of the founders of Palestine Action in her successful challenge to the proscription of the protest group as a terrorist organisation.
• R v. Graham and others (“the Colston 4”) [2022] EWCA Crim 1259, [2023] KB 37: successful defence of one of the Colston statue topplers who pulled down the statue of a slaver during a Black Lives Matter Protest in Bristol in June 2020. The legal directories describe her as the “mastermind” behind the case.
• Safe Access Zone Bill Reference [2022] UKSC 32, [2023] AC 505: intervened on behalf of JUSTICE in this reference by the Attorney General of Northern Ireland to the Supreme Court concerning the compatibility with Article 10 and 11 ECHR of draft legislation criminalising protests outside abortion providers.
• DPP v. Ziegler [2021] UKSC 23 [2022] AC 408: successful Supreme Court appeal on behalf individuals convicted for their deliberately obstructive anti-arms protest; the seminal judgment established that restrictions on protest rights at the time of arrest, prosecution, conviction and sentencing have to be proportionate.
• R v. Thacker and others (“the Stansted 15”) [2021] EWCA Crim 97, [2021] QB 644: successful appeal against conviction on behalf of 15 protestors convicted of a terrorism-related offence for preventing a charter deportation flight from taking off from Stansted Airport.
• R v. Walton and Woodhouse: successful “lawful excuse” defence of a Methodist minister and Quaker charged with criminal damage following their break into BAE Systems to disable war planes bound for Saudi Arabia for use in Yemen.
• INEOS v. Persons Unknown [2019] EWCA Civ 515, [2019] 4 WLR 100: successful challenge to the grant of an unprecedented, wide-ranging injunction to a fracking company seeking to restrain anti-fracking protests across Britain.
• Insulate Britain Injunctions: advised Insulate Britain in relation to a number of injunctions prohibiting protests on various roads around the country.

Crime and International Criminal Law

Blinne is an experienced trial and appellate lawyer, repeatedly nominated Criminal Barrister of the Year in the legal directory awards. She is recognised as a “brilliant allrounder” – a “simply outstanding” and “supremely clever” barrister, “an excellent speech-maker”, with a “brilliant mind” who is “utterly committed to her clients”, “gives her all on every case”, and leaves “no stone unturned in considering possible defences”.

Domestically, Blinne practices in all areas of criminal defence and criminal justice, with a particular specialism in cases with an international law dimension. She is a leading expert in criminal cases concerning free-speech and protest, including those raising lawful excuse defences, such as the prevention of crime, consent and questions of proportionality and necessity under Articles 9, 10 and 11 ECHR. She also acts on behalf of defendants charged under anti-terrorism legislation for speech-related offences.

Blinne is also an international criminal law specialist: she is on the International Criminal Court’s list of Counsel, represents victims before that Court, and routinely acts and advises individuals and NGOs on matters of international criminal law. She also acts in death penalty appeals to the Privy Council, and undertakes trial observations in criminal proceedings overseas, raising due process concerns.

Her cases include:

• R v. Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh: acting for Irish rap group Kneecap’s Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh (known as Mo Chara), charged with an offence contrary to section 13 of the Terrorism Act 2000 in relation to an on-stage performance in London in November 2024.
• R v. Graham and others (“Colston 4”) [[2022] EWCA Crim 1259, [2023] KB 37: acted for one of the Colston 4, acquitted of criminal damage of the statue of a slaver in Bristol, pulled from its plinth in the course of a Black Lives Matter protest in June 2020.
• R v. Kingston and others (“DLR 2”): successful defence of Extinction Rebellion climate protesters who climbed on top of a DLR train to protest government inaction over climate change.
• R v. Brown [2022] EWCA Crim 6, [2022] 1 Cr App R 18:successful appeal against sentence on behalf of a blind former Paralympian, sentenced to 12 months’ imprisonment for climbing on top of an airplane at City Airport as part of a climate change protest.
• R v. Thacker and others (“Stansted 15”) [2021] EWCA Crim 97: acted for one of 15 defendants prosecuted for a terrorism-related offence in relation to their direct action protest to prevent a charter deportation flight from taking off from Stansted Airport.
• R v Anjem Choudary [2016] EWCA Crim 61, [2018] 1 WLR 695: high profile case before the Court of Appeal concerning freedom of speech and freedom of conscience in the interpretation of terrorism legislation.
• R v. Ammori and others: successful defence of a number of protestors charged in relation to their obstruction of one of the largest arms fairs in the world, held in London.
• Situation in the State of Palestine: ongoing representation of Palestinian victims in relation to the ongoing investigation by the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court; written submissions on the jurisdiction of the Court over crimes committed by Israeli nationals in the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) and Gaza.
• Israeli Military Courts in the occupied Palestinian territory: advising a European NGO on the compliance of the Israeli military courts in the West Bank with humanitarian law, and fair trial standards under international law.
• Mohammed Nasheed trial: trial observation at the criminal proceedings against former President of the Maldives, Mohammed Nasheed, prosecuted on charges of having supported a coup against the government.
• Ahed Tamimi trial: trial observation in the Israel Military Courts in the West Bank of Palestinian teenager Ahed Tamimi, charged with hitting an Israeli soldier.

Nominations and Appointments

• Lawyer of the Year, Irish Women’s Lawyers Association 2025
• Full Adjunct Professor, University College Dublin, appointed 2025
• Adjunct Professor, University College Cork, appointed 2025
• Adjunct Professor, University of Galway, appointed  2025
• Shortlisted Human Rights and Public Law Silk of the Year, Chambers & Partners Awards 2025
• Mutatio Factorem (‘Change Maker’) Award, University College Cork Law Society 2024
• International Woman of the Year, Irish Tatler Awards 2024
• Ahmed Kathrada Excellence in Leadership Award, South African Congress of Business and Economics 2024
• Shortlisted International Law Silk of the Year, Legal 500 Bar Awards 2024
• International Law Junior of the Year, Legal 500 Bar Awards 2022
• “Commended” Barrister of the Year, Lawyer Awards 2022
• Lawyer of the Month, Irish Legal News, February 2022
• Lawyer of the Week, The Times, 13 January 2022
• Shortlisted Barrister of the Year, Legal Aid Lawyer of the Year Awards 2021
• Shortlisted Crime Junior of the Year, Chambers & Partners Awards 2021
• Shortlisted Crime Junior of the Year, Legal 500 Awards 2020
• Vice Chair of the Bar Human Rights Committee, 2014 to 2019
• Visiting Fellow, Harvard Law School, 2016 (research focused on the Arms Trade Treaty and on Israeli military courts in occupied Palestine)
• Visiting Fellow, Centre for Constitutional Rights, New York 2010
• Pegasus Scholarship, Inns of Court
• Phoenicia Scholarship, Bar European Group
• International Scholarship, Centre for Capital Punishment Studies
• Buchanan Prize, Lincoln’s Inn
• Bairstow Scholarship, Inns of Court School of Law
• St Thomas More Bursary, Lincoln’s Inn
• Lord Bowen Scholarship, Lincoln’s Inn
• Hardwicke Award, Lincoln’s Inn
• Foundation Scholarship, Queens’ College, Cambridge University

Professional and educational background

Prior to qualifying at the Bar, Blinne worked on the legal team representing the families of the dead and wounded on the Bloody Sunday Inquiry, and for a human rights solicitors’ firm in London. She also worked with prisoners on death row in Trinidad & Tobago.

She came to the Bar after an initial career working for a Washington-DC-based think tank.

Blinne graduated from Queens’ College, Cambridge University, with First Class Honours in Modern and Medieval Languages (French and Latin). She obtained a distinction on the Graduate Diploma in Law and was graded ‘outstanding’ on the Bar Vocational Course (placing fourth in her year).

She holds an LLM (equivalent distinction) in International Legal Studies from New York University, where she specialised in international environmental law and climate refugees. She also holds diplomas from the London School of Economics in Law, War and Human Rights, and International Human Rights Law and Practice.

Blinne is fluent in English and French. She speaks basic Irish and is learning Arabic.

Conferences and publications

A selection of Blinne’s speaking engagements and publications include:

• Keynote speaker, Irish Human Rights Centre, International Criminal Law Summer School, University of Galway, 2025
• Keynote speaker, Women in Law Conference, University College Cork, Law Society, 2024
• Panellist, Justice in Action: Beyond Promises to Progress,  and Evolving Jurisdictions of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and International Court of Justice (ICJ)​, Doha Forum, Qatar, 2024
• Speaker, The Importance of International Human Rights Law, in conversation with Professor Donncha O’Connell, Galway International Arts Festival, 2024
• Speaker, in conversation with Professor David Kenny, Other Voices Festival, Dingle, 2024
• Speaker, in conversation with Pádraig Ó Muirigh, Féile an Phobail, Belfast 2024
• Panellist, How Might Justice and Accountability be Achieved?, Reimagining Palestine Conference, Georgetown University in Qatar, 2024
• Panellist, ‘Milestones in International Criminal Justice: The ICC and Palestine’, Chatham House, 2014
• Author, “Civilian Protections and the Arms Trade Treaty”, in The Grey Zone, Lattimer & Sands (eds) (Hart, 2018)
• Contributing author, Human Rights and Criminal Justice, Emmerson, Ashworth and Macdonald (2nd Ed., Sweet & Maxwell, 2007)

Blinne is committed to protecting and respecting your privacy. In order to provide legal services to her clients, including advice and representation services, Blinne needs to collect and hold personal data. This includes her client’s personal data and the personal data of others who feature in the matter upon which she is instructed. To read Blinne’s privacy notice in full, please see here.

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