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UWI St Augustine wins Best Team from an Academic Institution at the CCJ VII Moot Competition

For Release Upon Receipt - March 19, 2015

St. Augustine


Second Mooting Title for the Faculty of Law

ST. AUGUSTINE, Trinidad and Tobago – A team from The University of the West Indies (UWI) St Augustine Campus’s Faculty of Law took the prize for the “Best Team from an Academic Institution” at this year’s Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) VII Annual International Law Moot competition. This prize is given to the best law faculty or academic institution with the highest marks for their skeleton argument, list of authorities and oral presentation at the competition. The competition took place on March 13 at the CCJ’s Headquarters in Port of Spain.

This is the second Mooting Title for the Faculty of Law. In April 2014, another team won the ‘Best New Team’ prize out of 126 teams at the 55th Phillip C. Jessup International Law Moot Competition held in Washington D.C. The ‘Best New Team’ award is given to a team who joined the competition within the past three years and obtained the highest marks in the oral and memorial writing sections combined.

There were eight participants in this year’s CCJ VII International Law competition, including the Eugene Dupuch Law School (The Bahamas); FHR-Lim A Po School of Social Studies (Suriname); Hugh Wooding Law School (Trinidad and Tobago); Norman Manley Law School (Jamaica); the Department of Law of the University of Guyana; the Faculty of Law of the University of Technology (Jamaica); the Faculty of Law, The UWI Cave Hill (Barbados) and Faculty of Law, The UWI St. Augustine (Trinidad). The team from the Bahamas won the overall best team at the CCJ moot.

In his opening remarks, The Rt. Honourable Sir Dennis Byron, President of the CCJ, spoke of the benefits of the moot: “Here at the CCJ, we believe this is one of the most efficient ways of ensuring thorough knowledge of the ins and outs of the revised treaty and how it may be interpreted and applied. Mindful of the central role of the CCJ in the CSME, uppermost among our concerns is that the treaty and its interpretation and application be subjects of widespread debate and discussion.” The CCJ judges were very impressed by the high-level of submissions of the teams and commended their efforts, stating that they “keep getting better and better each year”.

The CCJ’s Annual International Law Moot Court Competition was inaugurated in 2009 to encourage law students to become familiar with the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas, the instruments establishing the CCJ and other areas of international law. This year’s moot case dealt with issues of enforcement of decisions of the CCJ as well as referrals by national courts over questions concerning the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas. Arguments were presented before a panel of CCJ judges.

The UWI St. Augustine’s team advisor was Mrs Alicia Elias-Roberts, Deputy Dean in the Faulty of Law and the team members included Shane Pantin, as lead counsel; Maria Sawh as junior counsel and Neetu Lalsingh as the researcher/reserve.

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About The UWI

Since its inception in 1948, The University of the West Indies (UWI) has evolved from a fledgling college in Jamaica with 33 students to a full-fledged, regional University with well over 40,000 students. Today, UWI is the largest, most longstanding higher education provider in the Commonwealth Caribbean, with four campuses in Barbados, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and the Open Campus. The UWI has faculty and students from more than 40 countries and collaborative links with 160 universities globally; it offers undergraduate and postgraduate degree options in Food & Agriculture, Engineering, Humanities & Education, Law, Medical Sciences, Science and Technology and Social Sciences. UWI’s seven priority focal areas are linked closely to the priorities identified by CARICOM and take into account such over-arching areas of concern to the region as environmental issues, health and wellness, gender equity and the critical importance of innovation. Website: www.uwi.edu

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