Professor Sean D. Murphy is the Manatt/Ahn Professor of International Law at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where he has taught international law and U.S. foreign relations law since 1998.  Having received law degrees from Columbia and Cambridge Universities, he began his career as a lawyer at the U.S. Department of State, where he worked on matters relating to dispute resolution, oceans, environment, and the law of war.  For three years, he was the Legal Counselor of the U.S. Embassy in The Hague, serving as the U.S. Agent to the Iran-U.S. Claims Tribunal and arguing cases before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), including the Lockerbie case, the Oil Platforms case, and the Nuclear Weapons advisory opinion.  As an academic, he has published widely in the field of international law, such as his treatise on Principles of International Law and his Hague Academy lectures on International Law relating to Islands.  Since entering academia, Professor Murphy has served as counsel, arbitrator or ad hoc judge in cases before the ICJ, the Eritrea-Ethiopia Claims Commission, ICSID, the PCA, the International Criminal Court, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, and UN Convention on the Law of the Sea Annex VII tribunals.  He is an associate member of L’Institut de Droit International, and previously served as a Member of the UN International Law Commission, President of the American Society of International Law, and a Member of the Board of Editors of the American Journal of International Law.

Dr Vilawan Mangklatanakul, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Kingdom of Thailand to the Republic of Austria, the Republic of Slovenia and the Slovak Republic and Permanent Representative of the Kingdom of Thailand to the United Nations and other International Organisations in Vienna, is a career diplomat who has been with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Thailand since 1995. She has built her expertise in important areas of international law including diplomatic and State immunities, treaty law, intellectual property and international economic law. She also has a keen interest in investment law and dispute mechanisms. She was recently elected as a member of the International Law Commission.

Professor Martins Paparinskis is Professor of Public International Law at University College London and a Member of the United Nations International Law Commission. He has published on international law, including international investment law, in leading peer-reviewed journals, and his work is regularly cited by domestic courts and international tribunals on these issues. Martins is also a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration, ICSID Panels of Arbitrators and of Conciliators, OSCE Court of Conciliation and Arbitration, and UNECE Water Convention’s Implementation Committee.

Dr Penelope Ridings is an International Lawyer and Member of the International Law Commission for the term 2023-2027. She has broad experience in international law, including as former New Zealand Chief International Legal Adviser and Ambassador. Currently she is an Honorary Professor of Law at the University of Auckland and practices in the field of public international law, including law of the sea, fisheries, environmental law, trade and investment, international security and international dispute settlement. Dr Ridings is an arbitrator under the World Trade Organisation Multi-Party Interim Appeal Arbitration Arrangement and is serving as a member of an Ad Hoc Annulment Committee under the International Convention for the Settlement of Investment Disputes. She was Agent for New Zealand before the International Court of Justice in Whaling in the Antarctic: Australia v Japan, New Zealand Intervening and before the International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea in the Request for an Advisory Opinion submitted by the Sub-Regional Fisheries Commission. As an international lawyer and diplomat she has represented New Zealand in multilateral negotiations, including on port state measures, marine biodiversity beyond national jurisdiction, regional fisheries management, international criminal law and trade.

Lucy Reed (moderator) is an independent arbitrator with Arbitration Chambers (New York), currently serving as President of the Singapore International Arbitration Centre Court and President of the International Council for Commercial Arbitration. Lucy retired in 2016 from the international law firm Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, where she led the international arbitration group, and then was Professor of Practice and Director of the Centre for International Law of the National University of Singapore through 2019. In addition to her expertise in international commercial and investment treaty arbitration, she served as an arbitrator on the Eritrea-Ethiopia Claims Commission and co-director of the Claims Resolution Tribunal for Dormant Accounts in Switzerland. While with the US State Department Legal Adviser’s Office, Lucy was the US Agent to the Iran-US Claims Tribunal and a Deputy Assistant Legal Adviser for International Claims and Disputes. She is a former President of the American Society of International Law, and delivered Hague Lectures on Private International Law in 2001.