Alexander Yankov
Associate Professor Alexander Yankov was awarded the honorary title "Doctor Honoris Causa of the Burgas Free University" at a solemn meeting of the Academic Council of the Bulgarian Free University on December 5, 1999.
Associate Professor Alexander Yankov is a member of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea and Chairman of the Bulgarian Association of International Law.
Born on June 22, 1924 in Burgas. He graduated in law from Sofia University in 1951. Assistant at the Faculty of Law of the Bulgarian Free University since 1951, and since 1964 he has been a senior assistant. He specialized in International Law at the Academy of International Law in The Hague in 1961. In 1964 he received the scientific degree "Candidate of Legal Sciences" and was elected as a chief assistant. From 1965 to 1973 he was an associate professor of International Law at the Faculty of Law of Sofia University, and from 1973 he was a professor at the Department of International Law and International Relations at the Faculty of Law of Sofia University, which he headed in the period 1980 - 1989.
In 1981 he was elected a corresponding member of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences and in 1988 - 1989 he headed the section of International Law and International Relations at the Institute of State and Law at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. During the period 1988-91 he was the deputy chairman of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.
In 1989-90 he was the chairman of the Committee for Science and Higher Education and the deputy chairman of the National Council for Education, Science and Culture. He was a member of the Presidium and chairman of the Union of Scientists in Bulgaria and a member of the Central Council of the Union of Lawyers in Bulgaria. In the period 1972-76 he was the Ambassador of Bulgaria to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and in the period 1976-80 he was the Permanent Representative of Bulgaria to the UN in New York. Member of the UN Commission on International Law in Geneva in 1977-96, of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague since 1971, and since October 1, 1996 - of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea in Hamburg.
Member of the American Association of International Law in Washington since 1966; the International Law Association in London since 1968 and of its Executive Board; the French Association of International Law in Paris since 1982; the International Oceanographic Institute in Malta since 1969, of its Scientific Council since 1981 and Deputy Chairman since 1995; the Section on Sociology of International Relations in the International Sociological Association and its Deputy. - Chairman in the period 1972-77; Institute of International Law in Brussels since 1979; Independent World Ocean Commission in Lisbon since 1995
Since 1957, he has been a consultant on international law issues at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He represents our country in a number of international organizations and conferences: the UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of the Seabed and its Vice-Chairman (1968-73); the International Maritime Organization, chairing the Eighth Assembly in 1973-74 in London; the Third UN Conference on the Law of the Sea and chairman of its Third Committee at all sessions in 1973-82, and a number of others.
One of the founders of the Bulgarian Association of International Law in 1962 and its permanent chairman since 1982. Chairman of the National Association for International Relations since 1994.
Member of the National Assembly of the Republic of Bulgaria (1986-89) and the Seventh National Assembly (1990-91), member of the committees for drafting the Constitution and for foreign policy.
Recipient of the Orders "Cyril and Methodius" 1st class, "People's Republic of Bulgaria" 1st class and a number of others.
Associate Professor Alexander Yankov is a visiting professor at the universities of Virginia, New York, South Carolina, Cambridge, Oxford, Thessaloniki, Dalhousie (Canada), the European University in Florence, the Diplomatic Academy in Peru, the Aegean Academy of Maritime Law on the island of Rhodes, the World Maritime University in Malmö, the Hague Academy of International Law, etc.
He is the author of numerous publications in the field of theory and practice of international law, concerning the basic principles of international law and their codification, international treaties, the legal nature and international legal status of international organizations and especially the UN, the peaceful settlement of international disputes and the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice, diplomatic law, international maritime law, the international legal regime of marine environmental protection and marine scientific research, the main problems of international security and the legal regime of nuclear-free zones, and a number of others.
