Ronald Brand Runs Vis Middle East International Commercial Arbitration Pre-Moot in Vienna

On April 12-13, 2011, Professor Ronald Brand, along with 3L Amelia Mathias, and Rick Grubb, J.D. ‘10, coordinated training and administration of the the First Annual Willem C. Vis Middle East International Commercial Arbitration Pre-Moot in Vienna, Austria. The event was organized in coordination with the U.S. Department of Commerce Commercial Law Development Program (CLDP) and the Bahrain Chamber for Dispute Resolution (BCDR).  Katerina Ossenova, J.D. ‘08, coordinated the pre-moot on behalf of CLDP.  Participating teams of law school students from Sultan Qaboos University College of Law in Oman, the Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport in Egypt, and the Faculty of Legal, Political and Social Sciences of Tunis took part in oral argument training sessions and six rounds of moot arbitration.  In addition, Qatar University and UAE University College of Law competed in the written memoranda portion of the Pre-Moot. The students learned valuable skills in presenting oral arguments, advocating for their client, responding to arbitrators’ questions, conducting international case law research and analysis, and legal memorandum drafting.

            Prizes awarded at the Vis Middle East Pre-Moot were:

            Best Team Oral Argument: Sultan Qaboos University

            Best Individual Oralist: Humaid Al-Toubi, Sultan Qaboos University

            Best Memorandum for Claimant: Qatar University

            Best Memorandum for Respondent: Sultan Qaboos University