This week, the Argentine Foreign Ministry was very pleased to welcome the Argentine teams of the School of Law of the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) that won two international law competitions: Jessup, the world’s most important of its kind, and Vis, organized annually by the Pace University School of Law in Vienna.
The members of both teams —a total of 15 students— were received by the Head of the Foreign Minister’s Private Office, Ambassador Pedro Villagra Delgado, on behalf of Foreign Minister Susana Malcorra. He was accompanied by the Dean of the School of Law of the Universidad de Buenos Aires, Mónica Pinto, and authorities of the Argentine Foreign Ministry: the Head of the National Foreign Service Institute (ISEN), Ambassador Celeste Koch, and the General Director of the Directorate of Legal Advice, Minister Mario Oyarzábal.
Argentina has always given importance to international law as an instrument of its foreign policy, both as a matter of principle and with the conviction that it is the best tool to defend the country's interests in international negotiations or to enforce its rights and claims in disputes with other States.
Argentina's active role as an international player has translated into growing interest in studies on, knowledge and promotion of public and private international law, both at the individual and academic level. Our country is also recognized for the individual performance of a number of Argentine citizens as judges of the International Court of Justice, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the International Criminal Court, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, and the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, or as rapporteurs on certain issues within the framework of the International Law Commission or the UN Human Rights Committee.
The Argentine Foreign Ministry welcomes the fact that Argentine universities participate in moot court competitions and takes pride in the international recognition and collective triumph that the UBA has achieved with these winning teams.
· Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition
The Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition is the most important international law moot competition in the world, attracting participants from more than 550 law schools. Created in 1959 by students at Harvard, Yale and Columbia Universities, the competition currently involves schools from more than 80 countries.
The Competition is a simulation of an international law dispute between two fictional countries before the International Court of Justice. This year, the 57th edition of the competition dealt with the legitimacy of electronic surveillance systems and cyber attacks under international law.
The Argentine team beat London’s King’s College, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and the University of Pennsylvania, of the United States.
Argentina has generally been represented by the University of Buenos Aires, except in 2015, when the country was represented by Torcuato Di Tella University. In 2005, the University of Buenos Aires for the first time won third place in the competition.
· Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot
The Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot is held every year by Pace University School of Law in Vienna, with a focus on international arbitration and international sales transaction issues. The competition revolves around a dispute over a purchase agreement involving two States.
Students from different universities analyze a fictional contract for the international sale of goods, in order to support the interests of the claimant and the respondent before an arbitral tribunal.
The competition is held in Vienna and consists of a general round, after which the best 64 universities, out of a total of almost 300 participants, move on to the elimination rounds. In this edition, the UBA team beat universities from Germany, Finland, New Zealand, the Lebanese Republic and Singapore.
• Team members:
Philip C. Jessup Moot Court Competition
Sebastián Axel Green Martínez (academic tutor), Julián Rotenberg, Belén María Ibáñez, Carolina Catanzano, María Laura Pessarini, Adriana Estefanía Camaño.
Willem C. Vis Arbitration Moot
Roque Caivano (university teacher), Julián Bordacahar (academic tutor), Iván Levy, Juan Massun, Guillermina Fortunati, Juan Ignacio González Mayer, Florencia Lebensohn
Belén Pironi, Juan Ignacio Ruiz.
Press Release No. 121/16
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