ANJeL's Team Australia students excel again in Tokyo moot

Team Australia, a group of law students from across six Australian universities, have won the inaugural Chartered Institute of Arbitrators' Prize for Best Performance in the English-language Arbitration round and have come second overall in the 2017 Intercollegiate Negotiation and Arbitration Competition in Tokyo.

The Australian Network for Japanese Law (ANJeL), a unique cross-institutional initiative including Sydney Law School as a core member and Professor Luke Nottage as founding co-director, has supported Team Australia law students competing in the innovative Intercollegiate Negotiation and Arbitration Competition in Tokyo since 2005. Last year the team came first overall (for the third time), and this year the team was back in force - with 23 students - thanks to a three-year grant from the Australian government to support greater engagement with Asia.

Hundreds of students from around 30 universities across Japan and the Asia-Pacific competed in this year's competition held on 19-18 November, comprising arbitration and negotiation days, with English and Japanese language divisions in each. The arbitration round concerned the mooting of a dispute governed by the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts. The negotiation round required teams to reach a deal to bring an international joint venture to fruition, teaching and testing somewhat different skills that are also essential for legal advisors in the 21st century.

Team Australia’s success is the culmination of over three months of intensive preparations by the group of law students from the University of Sydney, the Australian National University (ANJeL member), Monash University, the University of the Sunshine Coast, and the University of Western Australia. These students made up four sub-teams, competing in the Japanese language division and three in the English language division. Sydney Law School was represented in the English-language division by Arts/Law student Samuel Hoare (winner of the ANJeL Akira Kawamura Prize in the Japanese Law course held offshore in February) and Commerce/Law student Rebecca Xu.

The students were coached this year by ANJeL Advisory Board Member and ANU professor Veronica Taylor, with Kieren Pender (Arts/Law, ANU and a member of last year's winning Team). Extra support in Tokyo was provided by former ANJeL Executive Coordinator Carol Lawson and Professor Luke Nottage.