Seminar on dispute settlement in the World Trade Organization held

Seminar on dispute settlement in the World Trade Organization held

On December 10th and 11th 2018, the seminar „Dispute Settlement in the World Trade Organization” was held at the University of Belgrade Faculty of Law. The seminar was chaired by Ms Cherise M. Valles, Deputy Director of the Advisory Centre on WTO Law (ACWL) in Geneva and a former Canadian diplomat and lawyer, while some aspects of this subject were covered by Mr Josip Pervan, program director of the Ideas Centre, a Swiss organization that provides support to the states that are candidates for WTO membership, who was himself a member of the negotiating team of Republic of Croatia during its admittance to the WTO and EU. The speakers have developed and analysed the issues of the place and significance of the system of settling disputes under WTO law, the institutional and procedural framework of the system of settling disputes, the matters of tactics and strategies of representing states in front of the panels for settling disputes and the Appellate Body, as well as the problem of trade wars in the modern age. The contemporary significance of the subject, the adequate choice of covered issues and the expertise of the speakers have caused great interest of our students on all levels of studies, so the Seminar was attended by more than 30 students despite being held completely in English. The Seminar was organized within the framework of cooperation between the University of Belgrade Faculty of Law and the Ideas Centre, which was officially established with the signing of the Memorandum on cooperation in May 2016 and within which a seminar on the legal framework of trade in services within WTO was already organized, as well as several scientific conferences within the area of international trade law and WTO law. The seminar coordinators from the University of Belgrade Faculty of Law were Assistant Professors Dr Milena Đorđević and Dr Marko Jovanović.