Book Talk: 'Sovereignty disputes and the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. A public order perspective' - Dr Tom D Grant, Lauterpacht Centre for International Law

Time: 5 pm - 6.30 pm 

Sovereignty disputes and the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea - A public order perspective

Summary: Because maritime questions are often admixed with territorial sovereignty questions, parties sometimes seek to settle them together. Jurisdiction under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), according to the received view, does not encompass disputes concerning territorial sovereignty. In this book, LCIL Fellow Tom Grant argues that the received view overstates the exclusion of sovereignty disputes. In Coastal State Rights, UNCLOS Annex VII arbitrators overstated the scope of the term 'sovereignty dispute' as well, an error of definition compounded when they ignored evidence probative as to whether a sovereignty dispute exists. Examining UNCLOS, its drafting history, and decades of decided cases, Sovereignty Disputes and the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea relates a current problem of international dispute settlement to the public order of which UNCLOS forms part.

Speaker: Dr Tom D Grant, Senior Research Fellow (Wolfson College) and Fellow of Lauterpacht Centre for International Law

Chair: Dr Joanna Gomula, Fellow of Lauterpacht Centre for International Law