RGU Law students compete in international moot in Vienna

The moot is a competition for law students from all over the world. It involves a dispute arising out of a contract of sale between two companies coming from countries party to the UN Convention on Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards and the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods.

This year RGU was represented in Vienna by Alexandru Caleap, Amy Gordon, Stephen Dickson, Natalia Kashina, Omar Bissoon, and Peter Murphy.

With several team members being distance learning students – Omar Bissoon coming all the way from Guyana in South America – the major part of preparation and coaching was conducted online.

Mr Murphy said: “Representing RGU in the moot was both a pedagogical and highly competitive experience. The necessary skills required for legal studies such as problem solving, legal analysis and reasoning, research, communication, organisation are all present in the competition.

“It is a continuous process stretched over six month culminating in the oral articulation of all the developed skills before the moot tribunals.”

Mr Bissoon added: “The moot experience exceeded all expectations and has given me the edge in preparation for my future in arbitration practice.”

The team started preparing for the competition in October 2014 when the problem was distributed.

They were then responsible for writing two memoranda, one for the claimant which was due in December and one for the respondent which had to be submitted in January.

After the briefs were submitted, the team prepared intensively for the oral argument phase of the competition taking part in several pre-moots before heading to Vienna.

Dr Andrey Kotelnikov, a lecturer in the Law School and the team coach, said: “This is the first time RGU took part in this prestigious competition and I am very happy about the results we achieved.

“All team members showed real dedication and character, mastered new skills and made lots of new friends.”