Yonsei Law School Students Perform Well
 

at International Commercial Arbitration Moot Competition

 

-Beat Harvard, Stanford En Route to Top 8 Finish

 

 

 

A team of Yonsei Law School students had a strong performance at the 13th Willem C. Vis East International Commercial Arbitration Moot (Vis Moot) in Hong Kong. Held between March 7 and 13, this year’s Vis Moot was particularly competitive, with 115 teams representing thirty-one different countries. In all, more than 1000 students, arbitrators, and coaches took part.

 

Under the guidance of Professor Kim Joon-gi, the Yonsei team advanced to the elimination rounds after defeating Harvard, Chulalongkorn University, University Paris Est Créteil, and Shantou University. Yonsei then went on to beat Stanford and Denver to reach the round of eight. This is the second consecutive year that Yonsei has placed in the top eight at Vis Moot, making it the only Korean university team to ever achieve this distinction.

 

 

Vis Moot is for law students from all countries, and it runs in parallel with the Willem C. Vis Moot in Vienna. The competition revolves around a dispute arising from a contract of sale between two countries, which must be settled through arbitration. For the competition, the law school teams prepare written memoranda and make oral arguments before an international arbitration panel. At the hearing, the arbitrators raise important questions, to which the competitors must respond.

 

According to Yonsei team leader Kim Han-wool, the arbitrators favorably evaluated the team’s performance during oral arguments, stressing the “confidence demonstrated in responding to questions.”Initially, said Kim, “we were nervous knowing that we had to compete with big names, but we gained more confidence after defeating teams from Harvard and Stanford in hearings using English. We came to understand that there is no mountain too high to climb.”