The first International Law of the Sea Moot Court Competition was held at China University of Political Science and Law (CUPL) on 27th – 28th October, 2018. The competition was organized by Chinese Society for the Law of the Sea (CSLOS), hosted by CUPL, and sponsored by Wuhan University, Tsinghua University, Hainan University and China Institute for Marine Affairs (CIMA). It is the first moot court competition based on the International Tribunal of the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) around the world. The competition applied proceedings of ITLOS, which are stipulated in the Part XV of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), or those of other international courts and arbitral tribunals. The grand final of the competition was judged by a bench consisting of members from international courts and/or tribunals, who represented the highest authority in law of the sea.

The Jury team members for preliminary and semi-final of the competition was from the Department of Treaty and Law, Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), CIMA, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS). The grand final of the competition was judged by Judge Zhiguo Gao (China), Judge Kriangsak Kittichaisaree (Thailand) and Registrar Philippe Gautier (Belgium) from ITLOS. The competition included two parts: written submissions and oral rounds. Nine university teams entered into the moot court competition after strict screening on written submissions, Wuhan University, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing Normal University, China University of Political Science and Law, International Islamic University Malaysia, Ocean University of China, Shandong University, University of International Relations and Xi’an Jiaotong University.

Wuhan University team was coached by Xiaolu Lei, associate professor of CIBOS, entered into semi-final and final of the competition with great performance in the preliminary. Our team won the second prize, The Best Applicant’s Written Submission, The Best Respondent’s Written Submission and The Best Overall Written Submission.

(Rewritten by Yu Minna)

(Edited by Fu Shanshan)