Surya P. Subedi

Profile

Professor Surya Subedi OBE has wide-ranging experience of advisory and advocacy work in several jurisdictions in public international law (broadly construed), international investment law, World Trade Organization law, international investment/commercial arbitration, and human rights law and has published widely in these areas. In 2004 he was appointed by the World Trade Organization to serve as a Member of the roster of Panellists of the WTO Dispute Settlement System. He has advised a number of countries including Britain, the Netherlands, Indonesia, Vietnam, Nepal, and Laos on various international legal matters and represented and advised three major public utility companies in two developing countries in their disputes with multinational companies.

Prior to joining the Bar of England, he was a Consultant on international legal matters to Mishcon de Reya Solicitors in London. He originally was admitted to the Bar of Nepal in 1981 and practised there both as an Advocate and as a government lawyer during which he served as legal adviser to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and to the Ministry of Commerce and Under-Secretary in the Ministry of Law and Justice. He has worked at the UN in New York as a Nepalese delegate.

He has been Professor of International Law since 1999 – first at the University of Hull and since 2004 at the University of Leeds. He is one of those rare academics who rose from a Lecturer to Professor in British academia within a matter of mere six years. He also is one of those rare lawyers who has received royal honours from the monarchs of two countries for his services to international law: Her Majesty the Queen of the UK appointed him an OBE - Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire - in 2004 and His late Majesty King Birendra of Nepal decorated him by the Order of Suprabal Gorkha Daxinbahu in 1998.

Professor Subedi has been awarded numerous prizes and scholarships including:

• Dasturzada Pavry Memorial Prize of the University of Oxford for his doctoral thesis.
• Josephine Onoh Memorial Prize of Hull University for best LLM student of the year.
• Foreign and Commonwealth Office Scholarship to Oxford for his doctoral studies.
• British Council Scholarship to Hull University for his LLM studies.

Experience

• Formerly Consultant on international legal matters to Mishcon de Reya Solicitors in London.
• Advisory work for various governments, including Britain, the Netherlands, Indonesia, Vietnam, Nepal, and Laos, on international legal matters.
• Advisory work for three major public utility companies in two developing countries in their disputes with foreign multinational companies.
• Legal adviser to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Ministry of Commerce, Government of Nepal.
• Advisory and advocacy work from the Office of the Attorney-General of Nepal.

Publications

Author, International Investment Law: Reconciling Policy and Principle (Hart Publishing, Oxford, in Press, 2008) 

Author, International Watercourses Law for the 21st Century: The Case of the River Ganges Basin (Ashgate Publishing, UK, 2005)

General Editor, Asian Yearbook of International Law (Martinus Nijhoff/Brill, The Hague1999-2006)

In the Media

2006 - The Netherlands International Law Review (Vol. 53 [2]) published an article entitled The Notion of Free Trade and the First Ten Years of the World Trade Organization: How Level is the “Level Playing Field”?

2006 - The International Lawyer (Vol. 40 [1]) published an article entitled The Challenge of Reconciling the Competing Principles within the Law of Foreign Investment with Special Reference to the Recent Trend in the Interpretation of the Term “Expropriation”

April 2003 - International and Comparative Law Quarterly (Vol. 52 [2]) published an article entitled The Road from Doha: The Issues for the Development Round of the WTO and the Future of International Trade

2003 - Resolution of International Water Disputes (Volume 6 in the PCA Peace Palace Papers series, The Hague, Kluwer Law International) published an article entitled Resolution of International Water Disputes: Challenges for the 21st Century in International Bureau of the Permanent Court of Arbitration.

1999 - Brooklyn Journal of International Law (Vol. 25 [2]) published an article on Balancing International Trade with Environmental Protection: International Legal Aspects of Eco-labels

Memberships

• Executive Member, Asian Society of International Law, Singapore.
• Member, South Asia Programme Advisory Group, INTERIGHTS (Centre for the Legal Protection of Human Rights), London.
• Fellow, the Royal Society of Arts, London.
• Member, Nepal Bar Association, Kathmandu.
• Member, Middle Temple, London.

Qualifications

• DPhil in Law, University of Oxford
• LLM with Distinction, University of Hull
• LLB and MA, Tribhuvan University

Appointments

UN Human Rights Council has appointed Professor Subedi as the next UN Special Rapporteur for Human Rights in Cambodia

Member, Roster of Panellists of the Dispute Settlement Body of the World Trade Organisation.

Crown Representative, Governing Board, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London.