North American Qualifying Round for ICC Moot Court Competititon This Weekend

The American Society of International Law has announced that the annual Pace Law School International Criminal Court Moot Competition, which is being held this weekend, is now the North American qualifying round for the ICC Trial Competition held in The Hague. The North American qualifying round is open to teams from the U.S, Canada, and Mexico.

The global rounds at the Hague will be held on February 16-20, 2009.  The new global competition is sponsored by the Dutch government, in cooperation with Pace Law School, the University of Amsterdam, the American Society of International Law, and the International Criminal Law Network (ICLN). 

According to the ASIL’s website:

Each team will submit three short memorials (briefs) requiring the students to research and develop arguments based on the three participants in ICC prosecutions, i.e., the Prosecution, the Defence and the Victims’ Advocates, a new role developed for the first time for the International Criminal Court. These memorials will be evaluated by legal scholars, and prizes will be awarded for best brief, second place runner-up, and third place runner-up in each of the three categories of memorials. Rules and regulations for participation are available on the ICC Trial Competition website. [See also this link: Case and Rules]

 

 Perhaps the most exciting feature of the Moot, and one unique to this competition, is that each team of students will participate in three rounds of oral arguments and have the opportunity of arguing from all three perspectives, prosecutor, defence counsel and victims’ advocate. Students who participated in a trial run for the Moot last year all commented that they had never experienced a better way of learning the substantive and procedural law in a given area and fully developing the arguments of the parties than by having the opportunity to make those arguments from all three perspectives during the Moot.

The two highest scored teams in the North American Round will advance to the finals in The Hague, to compete against qualifying teams from other areas of the world.

We wish the best of luck to the teams competing this weekend.