Speakers at the
Dublin International Arbitration Day 2023

Panel 2

Arbitration, Bankruptcy & Sanctions

Ronnie Barnes

Cornerstone Research, London

Ronnie co-heads Cornerstone Research’s international arbitration and litigation practice. He is an expert in accounting, damages, and valuation. He specialises in cases that raise complex valuation issues, including the estimation of the cost of capital, the determination of country risk premia, and the valuation of complex financial instruments such as derivatives and structured finance products. Who’s Who Legal has recognised Ronnie as a leading expert witness in legal arbitration and a global leader in assessing the quantum of damages in the financial advisory and valuation field.

Matthew H. Adler

Troutman Pepper, US

Matthew is the Chair of the International and Domestic Arbitration Practice Group at Troutman Pepper Hamilton Sanders LLP. Troutman Pepper was formed in 2020 with the merger of the Troutman Sanders and Pepper Hamilton firms and is now an AmLaw 50 law firm. Before arriving at Pepper Hamilton in 1989, Matt was a lawyer at the Office of the Legal Adviser at the United States Department of State. Matt has led ad hoc and institutional arbitration teams in the US and abroad including before the HKIAC, LCIA, ICC, SCC, CIETAC, SIAC, AAA, and JAMS. He is the author of a widely used US law school text entitled Arbitration: Cases, Problems, and Practice (2017).

Shawn Conway

Conway & Partners, Netherlands

Shawn has practised law for more than 40 years; more than 35 years in the Netherlands following five years in the United States. He serves on the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) Commission on Arbitration and ADR. He is a founder and Board Member of the Court of Arbitration for Art. He has served on the Board of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators. He is ranked a Top Commercial Arbitration Practitioner in The Netherlands by Expert Guides as well as listed in Who’s Who Legal in the construction field.  Shawn has extensive experience in international arbitrations around the world under various institutional rules (including ICC, NAI, AAA, ICDR, UNCITRAL, LCIA, LMAA, WIPO, and other regional institutes) as well as ad hoc arbitrations.

Stavros Pavlou

Patrikios Pavlou & Associates LLC, Cyprus

Stavros is the Executive Chairman of Patrikios Pavlou & Associates LLC. He is an experienced litigator, arbitrator and legal consultant and he is widely regarded as one of the top litigators in Cyprus. Stavros represents an impressive portfolio of major local and international corporate clients and high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) in commercial dispute resolution matters, including judicial and arbitration proceedings in the courts of Cyprus and abroad. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (CIArb) and Asian Institute of Alternative Dispute Resolution (AIADR), a practising barrister before the Commercial Court of the Dubai International Financial Center (DIFC) and a member of many international associations including the IBA, LCIA and ICCA.

Diora Ziyaeva

Dentons LLP, New York

Diora is a Partner at Dentons LLP in New York. Her practice focuses on investor-state arbitration, international commercial arbitration, and public international law. Dual qualified in Uzbekistan and New York, fluent in seven languages, she has 14 years of experience successfully representing sovereign states and corporate clients in over 30 significant international arbitration proceedings. Diora is the first female from the Republic of Uzbekistan to graduate from Harvard Law School. She co-chairs the Investment Law committee of the International Law Association, where she also sits on the Board of Directors. She is a certified mediator, arbitrator, and serves as an Adjunct Professor of Law at Cornell Law School.

Address:

International Arbitration – A view from Government

Rossa Fanning SC

Attorney General

Rossa was appointed as Attorney General of Ireland on December 17, 2022. Prior to his appointment, he was a Senior Counsel at the Irish Bar with a varied caseload spanning commercial law, judicial review, defamation and privacy law. He was called to the Irish Bar in 1999 and became a Senior Counsel in 2016. He is a Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution (CEDR)-accredited mediator and was admitted to the Bar of Northern Ireland in 2019. He was awarded BCL and LLM degrees from University College Dublin and holds an LLM from the University of Michigan.

Panel 3

Artificial Intelligence, ChatGPT & Arbitration

Paula Gibbs

A&L Goodbody LLP, Dublin

Paula is a senior associate in the Dispute and Investigations group at A&L Goodbody. She advises clients on complex commercial disputes. She has acted as counsel in commercial and investment treaty arbitrations under various institutional rules including UNCITRAL, LCIA, ICC, SIAC, HKIAC and ICSID, and ad-hoc proceedings. Before returning to Ireland, Paula practised in London, Singapore, New Zealand, Hong Kong and the British Virgin Islands.

Sanaa Babaa

EY, London

Sanaa is a Director in EY’s Claims and Disputes team in London, with 17 years of expert witness experience working with clients and their legal counsel. She specialises in performing accounting, economic and complex data analysis to assess damages and potential liabilities in commercial arbitration and litigation. She has acted as expert and led expert witness project teams in cases under ICC, LCIA, JCAA, LMAA and UNCITRAL rules and before the UK High Court. She has also been involved in matters with various authorities, including the US Department of Justice, and has been on secondment with the UK Serious Fraud Office.

Stephen Dowling SC

Bar of Ireland/TrialView

Stephen is Senior Counsel in Ireland, with over 18 years’ experience in commercial and civil litigation. Author of the Commercial Court (Round Hall 2nd Edition), with an MA in Commercial Law from Cambridge University, he is also founder and CEO of TrialView, an AI-driven litigation platform.

Tunde Oyewole

Of Counsel, Orrick, Paris

Tunde represents investors, developers, states and companies in arbitrations under all the major arbitral rules including the ICC, SCC, CRCICA, LCIA, ICSID, as well as in ad hoc arbitrations under the UNCITRAL rules.  He has represented clients in post merger and acquisition (M&A), corporate shareholder, foreign investment and intellectual property disputes in a number of sectors – nuclear medical technology, engineering and infrastructure, telecommunications and satellite financing, power and energy including renewables, mining, cement, real estate, and insurance.

Dr Nils Rauer MJI

Pinsent Masons, Frankfurt

Nils is a partner with Pinsent Masons located in Frankfurt, Germany. He heads up the firm’s German intellectual property practice. He focuses on digital transformation, the digital single market within the EU as well as the protection, use and enforcement of IP rights, notably copyright. He enjoys a long-standing reputation as litigator. On numerous occasions, he has represented clients in precedent-setting cases before the German Federal Court as well as the European Court of Justice.

Panel 4

ESG Issues in Arbitration

Susan Ahern BL

The Bar of Ireland

Susan Ahern FCIArb is an Irish barrister, international arbitrator, and certified mediator. She has a 20-year in-house background in banking and financial services, broadcasting and sport and is the former General Counsel of World Rugby. She is an arbitrator of the Court of Arbitration for Sport and was appointed to the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. She is a member of the ICSID Panel of Conciliators, an arbitrator member of the European Commission Disputes Settlement Pool, Secretary of Arbitration Ireland, and a member of the Arbitration & ADR Committee of The Bar of Ireland. She regularly sits as an arbitrator in ad hoc and institutional arbitrations. She has also been called to The Bar of Northern Ireland and is a door tenant at 33 Bedford Row Chambers.

Nessa Cahill SC

The Bar of Ireland

Nessa was called to The Bar of Ireland in 1999 and practised law in Shearman & Sterling in New York before commencing practice as a barrister in Ireland. She was called to the Inner Bar in 2020 and her practice is focused on intellectual property (particularly in the pharmaceutical industry), banking, energy and telecommunications regulation, as well as other areas of commercial and public law. She is also admitted to practice at The Bar of Northern Ireland and in New York.

Matthew E. Draper

Draper & Draper, New York

Matthew is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators. He is an arbitrator, international arbitration counsel, and litigator. He leads the firm’s international arbitration practice, which is ranked as a top practice nationwide by U.S. News Best Lawyers “Best Law Firms” 2022. He sits as an arbitrator in international disputes administered by the ICC and ICDR, and U.S. commercial disputes administered by the AAA. He serves on the arbitrator rosters for the AAA’s Large and Complex disputes, the ICDR’s international panel, and the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC).  He also sits as arbitrator in ad hoc arbitrations under the UNCITRAL rules.  His commercial disputes practice focuses on energy and water-related disputes. He regularly represents clients in transboundary water disputes.

Colleen Parker Bacquet

ICC International Court of Arbitration, Paris

Colleen is Counsel of the common law team at the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) in Paris, France. As Counsel, she oversees international commercial arbitration cases under the ICC rules related to the UK, Ireland, and common law countries in Africa. She completed her legal education in the United States and France, and has experience working with law firms in Italy and the United States.

Jeremy Wilson

Covington & Burling LLP, London

Jeremy is co-chair of Covington & Burling’s International Arbitration Practice Group in London. He advises and represents parties in price review disputes, investor-state matters, and commercial arbitration matters, including in both ad hoc proceedings under the UNCITRAL rules, and institutional arbitrations under the rules of the ICC, HKIAC, the SCC, the DIAC, and the LCIA, in venues around the world. He has particular experience and a proven track record advising clients in the energy, life sciences, media, and consumer brands sectors.

Panel 5

Quick fire round

The Hon. Mr Justice David Barniville

President of the High Court, Ireland

David is the President of the High Court of Ireland. He was appointed a judge of the High Court in December 2017 after almost 27 years in practice as a barrister and Senior Counsel. He was the judge in charge of the Commercial Division of that Court (2019-2021). He was also designated as the Arbitration Judge to hear all arbitration-related matters in the High Court. He was previously the judge in charge of the Strategic Infrastructure List in the High Court (2018-2019). He was appointed to the Court of Appeal in August 2021. He was appointed President of the High Court in July 2022. In July 2018, he was appointed as a member of Ireland’s National Group on the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague. He was the President of the Association of Judges of Ireland (2019-2021) and is Senior Vice Chair of the Judges Forum of the International Bar Association (IBA).

Daragh Brehony

Pérez-Llorca, Madrid

Daragh is a senior associate in the Madrid office of Pérez-Llorca, specialising in international arbitration. He regularly advises clients in disputes related to construction, renewable and non-renewable energies, infrastructure, and industrial manufacturing. He is registered to practice law in Ireland, New York, and Madrid. He also teaches classes in common law at different universities in Madrid.

James Coleman

Goldman Ismail, Chicago

Originally from Galway, James is a senior associate at a trial and arbitration boutique firm in Chicago. He represents technology and pharmaceutical clients in complex and high-stakes mass tort and commercial litigation in courts throughout the United States and in commercial arbitrations before domestic and international arbitral bodies. He is a graduate of University College Dublin (BCL) and Northwestern University (JD).

Kieran John McCarthy

Gateley, London

Kieran is a dual-qualified (England and Wales/New York) disputes specialist in international arbitration and complex cross-border litigation, with a particular focus on the intersection of private and public international law and highly regulated industries, such as commodities, energy, technology and financial services.

Prior to joining Gateley, he spent a decade with leading global international law firm teams in London and Switzerland, advising and acting as advocate for corporations, sovereigns, state-owned entities, individuals and international organisations on a range of high-value, strategically important and politically sensitive disputes.

Louis Flannery KC

Mishcon de Reya LLP, London

Louis specialises in arbitration and litigation with a particular emphasis on fraud and conflict of law issues. He is a regular speaker on arbitration and civil fraud at conferences all over the world. He has extensive experience of international commercial arbitration under the major institutional rules (LCIA, ICC, UNCITRAL, SCC, etc.) as well as substantial High Court litigation in England. As a practising solicitor advocate, he has undertaken advocacy before international tribunals and courts, including the High Court and Court of Appeal. He has acted or advised in relation to commercial disputes for over 30 years and has been involved in many reported decisions in England.

Anya George

Schellenberg Wittmer, Zurich

Anya is a Partner in Schellenberg Wittmer’s Dispute Resolution Group in Zurich. She represents clients in complex international commercial and investment arbitration matters, as well as in enforcement and setting-aside proceedings before the Swiss Supreme Court. She has special expertise in insurance and reinsurance, energy infrastructure, natural resources and commodities disputes, and advises clients in ESG matters. She is qualified as a Swiss attorney and a solicitor of England and Wales, and practises in English, French and German.

María Paula Jijón

Legal Counsel, CIAM

María Paula is currently Legal Counsel at the Madrid International Arbitration Center and the Madrid Court of Arbitration. Previously, she was an associate in Arias SLP, a law firm specialised in international arbitration. Additionally, she actively engages in scholastic events. She participated in an international arbitration module at Columbia Law School and is an organiser of the Moot Madrid International Arbitration competition.

Niamh Leinwather

Vienna International Arbitral Centre

Since January 1, 2022, Niamh has taken office as the new Secretary General of the Vienna International Arbitral Centre (VIAC). Of Irish origin, she has both a common and civil law background (Bachelor of Civil Law, University College Dublin, Mag.iur., University of Vienna, Master of European Studies, University of Vienna). She was the first Irish woman to be admitted to the Austrian Bar in 2013 and has over a decade of experience in international dispute resolution at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer in Vienna, where she acted as both counsel and arbitrator.

Florian Stefan

Vavrovsky Heine Marth, Vienna

Florian is a partner at Vavrovsky Heine Marth in Vienna, Austria, where he co-chairs the firm’s International Arbitration practice group. He represents corporate and state clients in commercial and investment treaty arbitrations under all of the major institutional rules. His expertise covers a broad range of sectors and subject matters, with a particular focus on joint venture agreements, supply relationships and mergers and acquisitions contracts. He is listed and ranked in multiple legal directories, with clients describing him as an “excellent advocate” and “strategically sophisticated in cross-border matters”. He currently acts as regional ambassador for HK45, the young practitioners’ group of the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre (HKIAC), and previously was a regional representative for the Young International Arbitration Group (YIAG).

Bree Taylor

Alius Law, London

Bree is a partner of Alius Law, a London law firm specialising in commercial litigation and arbitration with a special focus on the aviation sector. She and her team advise aircraft leasing companies on claims for unpaid rent and maintenance costs, redelivery disputes, conditions precedent in fleet sale contracts and aircraft arrest and repossession. She and her team appear in the LCIA and the ICC as well as the Commercial Court in London.  Recent cases include claims over alleged force majeure events and the impact of Russia sanctions on the ability of a lessee to comply with lease terms as to maintenance. She is a member of the Insolvency Lawyers Association and a Fellow of R3, the Association of Business Recovery Professionals.