Researchers' Activities

CIL Director Professor Lucy Reed spoke at the international conference on ‘The Rise of International Commercial Courts’ at Qatar University on 13 May 2018. Professor Reed spoke about the Singapore International Commercial Court on a panel discussing comparative features of international commercial courts, including the Qatar International Court and Dispute Resolution Centre. The keynote speaker for the conference was Justice Ramesh Kannan of the Singapore High Court.

CIL Director Professor Lucy Reed spoke on the opening plenary panel of the bi-annual Congress of the International Council for Commercial Arbitration (ICCA) in Sydney, Australia. The panel theme was ‘Law-Making in International Arbitration: What Legitimacy Challenges Lie Ahead?’, and Professor Reed spoke on arbitration tribunals as lawmakers. Professor Stephan Schill of the University of Amsterdam moderated the panel, and the other panellists were Singapore Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon, ICC Court of Arbitration President Alexis Moure, and Professor Thomas Schultz of Kings College London. All the papers will be published in the official ICCA Congress Series (Wolters Kluwer).

Professor Reed also spoke at the follow-on AMINZ-ICCA International Arbitration Day in Queenstown, New Zealand, where the theme was ‘Making Arbitration Work in a Changing World: A Pacific View’. She was the commentator on Daniel Kaldermis’s keynote lecture entitled ‘International Arbitration in a Brave New World’.

Research Associate Ms Melissa Loja presented her research paper at the New Voices Panel at the 112th Annual Meeting of the American Society of International Law in Washington DC. Ms Loja’s paper was about international agreements between non-state actors. Her paper discussed international agreements that national petroleum corporations such as Petronas, PetroVietnam, PetroleumBrunei and China National Offshore Oil Corporations enter into to manage disputes over petroleum resources that are shared by states across maritime zones and boundaries.

Professor Laurence Helfer, Editor-in-Chief of the American Journal of International Law, remarked that her paper makes a concrete contribution to international law, because it presents primary data that have not been made known before, and it enables a granular examination of actual practices in international law.

On 1 February 2018, CIL Director Professor Lucy Reed spoke at a programme at the Supreme Court entitled ‘The Singapore International Commercial Court’s potential to advance the rule of law’. The conference was sponsored by the Singapore International Commercial Court (SICC), the Singapore International Law Association and Freshfields (Singapore). The speakers included two judges on the SICC, Justice Quentin Lowe and Sir Vivian Ramsey, as well as Mr Francis Xavier SC of Rajah & Tann, and Mr Nicholas Lingard and Mr Robert Kirkness of Freshfields. Professor Reed spoke on what characteristics make an international commercial court truly international.

CIL Director Professor Lucy Reed served as faculty at the 2017 Summer Institute of the ASEAN Human Rights Resource Centre (HRRC) held in Bali on 29–31 January 2018 (the volcano risk having postponed the original summer date). The chairman of the conference was HE Ambassador Ong Keng Yong, who is the chairman of HRRC and a member of the CIL Board of Directors. The theme of the conference was ‘Trade, Investment, and the Rule of Law in ASEAN’. Professor Reed spoke on ‘The Rule of Law and Dispute Resolution in ASEAN’ and moderated a panel on ‘Rights Dimensions in Trade and Investment in the ASEAN Community’.

The HRRC is a non-profit academic centre headquartered at the University of Indonesia in Jakarta, in partnership with 11 other academic institutions in 7 out of 10 ASEAN member states. Its mission is to support a rights-based approach to ASEAN integration through research, training and education, and its core thematic areas are rule of law, business and human rights, and the rights of vulnerable populations. The Summer Institute is the HRRC’s signature annual event, organised in collaboration with the WSD Handa Center for Human Rights and International Justice at Stanford University and Udayana University.

CIL Director Professor Lucy Reed represented the Centre at several events at the 2017 Seoul ADR Festival during the week of 6 November. At the joint programme of the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) and the Korea Commercial Arbitration Board (KCAB) on ‘Multiple Proceedings in Multiple Fora: Strategies and Synergies’, Prof Reed delivered the keynote address and was a speaker on the panel on ‘Consolidation and Joinder under Arbitral Institutional Rules’. She also spoke on the panel on International Investment Dispute Settlement, addressing ‘Momentum on Procedural Reforms:  The Way Forward’. Prof Reed was interviewed at the Young Arbitration Practitioners’ Forum ‘Fireside Chat’ organised by Young SIAC and the Korean Council for International Arbitration, and served as faculty for the second annual Seoul Academy for International Arbitration.

CIL Director Lucy Reed, Head of International Dispute Resolution (Practice Skills) J Christopher Thomas QC, Head of Investment Law and Policy Jansen Calamita, Practice Fellow Emily Choo, and Global Associates Mark Feldman and Tara Davenport were part of the faculty of the 2017 Singapore International Arbitration Academy, which was organised by the CIL on 25 October 2017–2 November 2017. Ms Emily Choo was also team coach to one of the teams that took part in the Academy’s arbitration moot.

CIL Research Associates Millicent McCreath, Robert Real and Zoe Scanlon attended the Academy as participants and took part in the arbitration moot. Ms Zoe Scanlon was awarded a prize for excellence in advocacy.

Professor Reed, Mr Thomas, Research Associate Professor (CIL) Calamita and Ms Choo were speakers and moderators in the panel sessions in the CIL International Conference on Global Currents in International Investment Law on 2 November 2017.

On 23 October 2017, CIL Director Lucy Reed delivered the Seoul Arbitration Lecture 2017, sponsored by the Seoul International Dispute Resolution Centre. The lecture title was ‘Suite for ISDS: Mediation, Arbitration and Appellate Bodies’. She addressed the need for lawyers practising in the field of investment treaty arbitration to expand their repertoire or suite of skills to keep up with developments. On the one hand, it is important to be prepared for the new investment court system envisioned in the new EU-driven free trade agreements and, on the other hand, to play a more active role in furthering settlements of suitable disputes by mediated negotiations. The audience comprised over 100 Korean ministry representatives, practitioners and academics.

At a reception at the Asian Civilisations Museum on the evening of 19 September, Fountain Court Chambers announced the winners of the Christopher Bathurst Prize 2017. The prize is an annual writing competition, named in honour of the late Christopher Bathurst QC, who was a long-standing senior member of Fountain Court Chambers with strong ties to Singapore. The prize is open to full-time students enrolled at the National University of Singapore Faculty of Law or the Singapore Management University School of Law, and lawyers under 30 years old qualified under the Legal Profession Act. The prize is supported by the Singapore Academy of Law.

On 12 September 2017, CIL Director Professor Lucy Reed delivered the John E.C. Memorial Lecture at the McGill Faculty of Law in Montreal. The title of Lucy’s lecture was ‘International Dispute Resolution Courts: Retreat or Advance?’, and she focused on the recent progress of the Singapore International Commercial Court. Lucy was introduced by McGill Dean Robert Leckey and Mr Pierre-Olivier Savoie. Professor Fabien Gelinas and Mr Stephen Drymer of Woods led the discussion that followed the lecture.