ICC Moot Court

The International Criminal Court (ICC) moot court competition is a competition with the main purpose of simulating the work and the functioning of the International Criminal Court headquartered in the Hague, the Netherlands. The ICC is dedicated to international criminal law and is held in collaboration with Leiden University, the Grotius Institute for International Studies, and the International Bar Association. Each year, the Executive Office of the Competition releases a hypothetical case concerning the newest international criminal law challenges that must be assessed by the teams. The participating teams have to compete in both writing and oral phases while playing three different roles of the Office of Prosecution, the Defence Counsel, and the Government's/Victims' Representative.
For the very first time, Allameh Tabataba'i University (ATU) decided to form a team composed of Niloofar Foroozanfar, Seyed Mohammadmohsen Seyed Ahmadi, and Ali Masoudian, all of whom were Bachelors students of law, coached by Maryam Aghaei. The Memoranda submitted by the team were averagely scored 91 out of 100. In the oral round, while competing with teams from the United States, Singapore, Australia, Canada, Palestine, Croatia, Italy, and Albania, ATU Team was qualified as the quarter-finalists of the Competitions. ATU Team was the third-best team in the preliminary round that was announced by Professor Michael Scharf as those qualified to be among the 27 best teams of the Competition. ATU Team was awarded the "Honourable Mention Prize" of the Competition in 2017. Ever since ATU has always had a representative in the international rounds of the ICC.
In the 2018 competitions, the ATU team, coached by Zahra Moshref Javadi, Farzaneh Montakhab, and Morteza Naderi, represented Iran in the international rounds in the Hague. The team, consisting of Ali Tousi, Ehsan Ahmadi, Parmida Asadi, and Negin Goharian as its members, succeeded to the Quarter Finals after beating the opponent teams from France and Canada.
In summer 2018, Mr Saeed Kaveh, as the team's coach, interviewed the volunteer students to select the future members of ATU's 2019 ICC team. To that end, he held an entrance test by representing the Nuremberg Moot Court Competition case 2018 and the volunteers worked on the case and wrote a memorial and mooted in front of the Coach and other judges. Finally, 4 students out of 14 were chosen as the main participants, namely, Ida Jodeiri, Parmiss Mirdar Harijani, and Bahar Babapour, all Bachelors students, and Mohammad Emami a Masters student. Mohammad Emami, later, left the team and the ATU team started its long and challenging mission right after the admission of team members in the summer. While the team was working hard on writing the memorials, it received an email from the organisers, mentioning that there should be a national round for Iranian teams. The national round was about writing a judgement on a new case, which was the first experience for Iranian ICC teams. The team had passed one of the most challenging and exciting weeks of its life and finally received a congratulatory, winning email. Therefore, it worked hard on the main case, every day, many hours a day, in the university's break times, holidays, and exam days.
Ultimately, the teams submitted the three memorials on 14 March 2019. After a few break days, each oralist started writing her role script, preparing for the Hague's oral rounds. The team worked on the oral round, every day asking each other tricky questions and practising varied situations that may take place. The team also had the honour to perform in front of the best ATU students who were participants of the former moot court competitions.
Doing the administrative steps for getting money and booking a hotel, was tough and time-consuming for the team members, but it was finally done. For instance, one week before travelling to the Hague, the reserved place for the team was all of a sudden cancelled and the team was so stressed and hopeless. After further checking, members booked another hotel in the last days before the competition.
The competition began in June 2019 and each team had to take part in 6 competitions for all three roles. The team of the Allameh Tabataba’i participated in the competitions that took place in 5 days. Each day some members were the mooters and others helped the team.
The Allameh Tabataba'i University 2019 team met many students from all over the world talking about the same issue being the matter of the legality of humanitarian interventions in the scope of individual criminal responsibility of the person who advises a State that humanitarian intervention is legally accepted in international law. While all the students talked about their arguments and met new friends, the issue was an unsolved and a grey area in international criminal law. And that is what makes ICCMCC astonishing.
In 2020, the team of Allameh Tabataba’i University was the only Iranian team that had been licensed to participate in these competitions for the fourth consecutive year. The first meeting of the team in the summer of 2019 was held in the Book Garden of Tehran, where the ten volunteers were present, and they were told that they are going to be evaluated by an entrance test. Volunteers studied many books written by highly professional authors such as Malcolm Shaw, William Schabas, and Cryer and also some related cases and articles.
Coaches of the team chose one of the main questions of the ICCMCC case for this evaluation. Strict teachers were present on the day of the test. Ultimately, three girls out of 10 volunteers were chosen as the team members, and the team officially began with its coach Ms. Maryam Aghaie and a coaching assistant Mr. Ali Tusi. But soon after, two others became members, and the five-member-girly team was completed. The members were Farzaneh Asadi, Aida Jodeiri, Roya Rostamabadi, Nushin Ebadi, and Parmis Mirdar Harijani who were all bachelor law students at Allameh Tabataba’i University.
The process of problem-solving questions, as the national round, was the glue that stuck us all together. Respecting each other’s talents, going vegan, reading books, having a 12-hour exam at six a.m., sleeping in turn for writing the judgment for the problem-solving question was part of experiences that made this team unique. Despite tough competitors, the team was able to pass the national round and resumed working on the international round writing the memorials. Writing memoranda was simultaneous with the outbreak of the Coronavirus in Iran. The pressure of quarantine days was a challenge in the middle of another challenge being writing memorials. Some days the team got low energy, but online meetings were fuel for staying strong.
Finally, the Allameh Tabataba’i 2020 team submitted the memorials. However, due to the pandemic, the oral rounds were cancelled, and a ceremony award for the winning memorials was held online. Although the 2020 competition was incomplete, the members now were well-acquainted with international criminal law matters and won a chance of learning so much. Allameh Tabataba'i team grew older in ICC 2020.
 

Consulting Professors: Dr. Pouria Askari and Dr. Heybatollah Najandimanesh