Another international distinction for the NKUA’s School of Law – Foreign Direct Investment International Arbitration Moot 2023

The Department of International Studies of the NKUA’s School of Law is particularly pleased to announce that a team of undergraduate students recently placed first in the world for their written memorial for claimant, earning the corresponding award (Best Memorial for Claimant), and third in the world for their overall written and oral performance (Combined Written and Oral Scores) in the Global Final Round of the international student arbitration moot court competition Foreign Direct Investment International Arbitration Moot 2023 (FDI Moot – http://www.fdimoot.org/ ).

The FDI Moot international investment arbitration moot court competition focuses on the constantly evolving international law of foreign investment protection, being, in fact, a simulation of the arbitration process for resolving international investment disputes. It is held each year under the auspices of the Centre for International Studies (Salzburg, Austria), the Law Schools of Suffolk University (Boston, Massachusetts) and Pepperdine University (Malibu, California), the German Institution of Arbitration – DIS (Frankfurt/Cologne, Germany), and the Centre of European Law of King’s College London. Each participating team of students must submit a memorial and present oral arguments (oral pleadings) for both the claimant (i.e., the foreign investor) and the respondent (i.e., the host state) in a hypothetical dispute in front of a panel of international arbitration specialists.

This year’s FDI Moot brought together 149 teams of students from Universities across the world, including King’s College London, Singapore Management University, the Law Society of Ireland, NALSAR University, the Diplomatic Academy of Viet Nam, the National Autonomous University of Mexico, Lomonosov Moscow State University, the National University of Singapore, the University of Hong Kong, the National Law School of India University, the University of Johannesburg, the University of Lagos, Xiamen University, Cairo University, the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul,  Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, O.P. Jindal Global University, Masaryk University, Del Rosario University, and Externado University of Colombia. Following the conclusion of the Regional Rounds, the Global Final Round of the FDI Moot 2023 took place from 2 to 5 November 2023 in Lucknow, India, with academics and executives from renowned international law firms participating as judges.

The NKUA’s School of Law participated for the 10^th year in the FDI Moot under the academic supervision of Assistant Professor Anastasios Gourgourinis. This year’s team that travelled to India for the Global Final Round of the competition consisted of the undergraduate students Eirini Alexiou, Alexandros Brachos, and Irene Chartzi. Their fellow students, Marousa-Ioanna Diamanti, Panagiotis Karagiannis, and Ermioni Koukouli, participated in the preparation of the written memorials. Coaching the team was attorney-at-law Maria Paschou.

This latest international distinction attests to the strong performance over time of the NKUA’s School of Law at the FDI Moot, dating back to its first entry in 2013. The participation of our team in the FDI Moot 2023 was made possible by generous support from the Law Firms ‘Zepos & Yannopoulos’, ‘Karatzas & Partners’, ‘Koutalidis’, ‘Lambadarios’, ‘Moussas & Partners’, ‘Ballas, Pelecanos & Associates’, and ‘PotamitisVekris’, for which we are grateful.