Dr. Wen Zhou is currently Legal Adviser of the Arms and Conduct of Hostilities Unit of the Legal Division at the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) Headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland. Wen’s functions include, among others, coordinating, developing and representing the ICRC’s legal and policy positions on a range of disarmament and new technology issues, notably autonomous weapon systems, military use of artificial intelligence, military operations in outer space, and legal reviews of new weapons.

Prior to joining the ICRC in 2013, Wen worked as Associate Legal Counsel in the World Bank Group (Washington D.C.) and Assistant Professor of Law in the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (Beijing).

Wen holds a Ph.D. in International Law and a Bachelor of Law from Peking University (China), and a Master of European Law from University of Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne (France). She also studied in The Hague Academy of International Law and the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law of Lund University (Sweden).

Wen frequently represents the ICRC as an expert speaker at various international events, both among diplomats and government officials such as processes under the UNGA and treaty mechanisms, and within academic expert circles. She is the main author of the ICRC position papers on outer space (2023, 2022 and 2021), and is in charge of the project of an updated ICRC Guide to the Legal Review of New Weapons, Means and Methods of Warfare.