In this panel session, the current and former women of the International Law Commission discussed their experiences in the Commission and their work on the progressive development of international law and its codification.

The speakers were:

Dr Nilüfer Oral is a member of the United Nations International Law Commission (ILC) and Co-Chair of the ILC Study Group on Sea-Level Rise in relation to International Law. She is the Director of the Centre for International Law, National University of Singapore. She served as a legal advisor to the Turkish Foreign Ministry on the law of the sea and climate change, and was a member of the Turkish delegation at the International Maritime Organization and in the climate change agreements from 2009 to 2016.

Professor Patrícia Galvão Teles has been a member of the United Nations International Law Commission (ILC) since 2017 and Auxiliary Professor of International Law at the Autonomous University of Lisbon since 2002. She is also member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration since 2016 and is currently Vice-President of the Portuguese Society for International Law. She is also Senior Legal Adviser on International Law at the Legal Department of the Portuguese Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Professor Concepción Escobar-Hernández has been a Member of the International Law Commission since 2017. She holds a Chair in International Public Law from the Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia, Spain, and was a director of the International Legal Department of the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation from 2004 to 2012.

Dr Marja Lehto is Ambassador and Senior Expert on International Law at the Finnish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. She has been a member of the International Law Commission since 2017 and is the Special Rapporteur for the topic Protection of the environment in relation to armed conflicts. She has served formerly, inter alia, as Ambassador of Finland to Luxembourg, Director of the Unit for Public International Law, MFA, and Counsellor and Legal Adviser of Finland’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations, New York.

Ambassador Marie Jacobsson is the Principal Legal Adviser on International Law at the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs. She was a Member of the UN International Law Commission from 2007-2016 and appointed Special Rapporteur for the topic, Protection of the Environment in Relation to Armed Conflicts in 2013. Jacobsson has served at the Legal Department of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs since 1987.