The CEELI Institute is formally established as an independent nonprofit, Czech public benefit company to advance the rule of law. The Institute holds its early programs in temporary facilities in Prague.

The CEELI Institute finds its permanent home in the Villa Grébovka, located inside Havlíčkovy Sady park in Prague 2. The Institute begins holding programs in the building, which was badly damaged during WWII, while embarking on needed renovations to bring the Villa back to its former glory.

On June 8th, former Czech president Vaclav Havel and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor join CEELI Founder Homer Moyer to dedicate the fully renovated and modernised Villa Grébovka as the headquarters and residential training facility of the CEELI Institute. 

The CEELI Institute helps establish the Conference of Chief Justices of Central and Eastern Europe, which annually brings together the senior judges from the region’s highest courts to share and develop strategies and best practices to promote judicial integrity and accountability, to improve court management, and to combat corruption in the courts.

The Network facilitates career growth and development for the judges, fosters peer engagement, and produces concrete tools to better assist the judges in performing their duties.

The CEELI Institute launches its weeklong interactive training designed and delivered by the world’s experts on investigating and prosecuting official corruption.

The Institute partners with the Tunisian judiciary to train nearly all Tunisian judges, focusing on judging in a democratic society. This program brings together judges from all ranks and courts in Tunisia at regular workshops designed to improve professional skills and to build the public’s confidence in the judiciary.

The Institute begins supporting human rights lawyers in Myanmar, in partnership with the Burma Center Prague.

The Institute starts a short-term respite program in Prague to build the professional skills of human rights lawyers and other human rights defenders who are facing professional and personal threats due to their work in authoritarian, repressive, or dangerous environments. 

Our work expands to India with a new partnership with the Indian National Judicial Academy and the U.S. Federal Judicial Center to promote exchanges between U.S. and Indian judges.

The Institute begins cooperating with anti-corruption watchdogs and launches anti-corruption training combining law enforcement with watchdogs, encouraging cooperation on corruption investigations.

The Institute starts a series of legal education programs for judges from Central and Eastern European Union member states on relevant EU instruments and directives governing the application of both civil and criminal law.

Amid the pandemic, the Institute launches CEELI Online, its one-stop hub for specialized, remotely accessible courses and dialogues for legal, judicial, and civil society professionals. Through this platform, CEELI offers integrated courses on a wide range of timely and relevant topics.

The African Judicial Exchange Network (AJN) is established, with an initial group of six countries. The AJN comprises judges from anglophone African countries who regularly gather to share knowledge and experience on issues such as judicial independence, anti-corruption, transparency, accountability, efficiency, and ethics.

Very soon after Russia’s war broke out in Ukraine, the Institute rapidly fundraised over $200,000 in private donations to provide humanitarian support to Ukrainian refugees in Prague. As the war carried on, we launched a Summer School for Ukrainian law students on legal skills needed during wartime that we have continued through 2025.  

The Institute revitalised its programs in number, scope, topics, geography, interactivity, and impact, upgraded the Villa Grebovka’s facilities, and renewed the Institute's leadership, while replenishing and diversifying its grant and donor funding in anticipation of a changing international assistance landscape.