A former Hong Kong justice minister who now heads an intergovernmental mediation body based in the city has said the organisation is ready to handle state-to-state disputes, with six countries having nominated more than 100 mediators from the legal, diplomatic and academic fields.
Teresa Cheng Yeuk-wah, secretary general of the International Organisation for Mediation (IOMed), told the South China Morning Post that Hong Kong is uniquely positioned to serve as an international legal capital in Asia, with other established destinations largely located in the West.
She said the organisation had already received a “not insignificant” amount of inquiries and expressions of interest in its services.
On the prospect of handling IOMed’s first state-to-state dispute, Cheng said: “We are definitely ready. The rules are there. The infrastructure support from the institution is here, and so what we are hoping and making sure that we can secure is the consent [from the two parties of a mediation].”
Cheng said six countries had so far nominated 26 mediators to handle state-to-state disputes.
The mediators, nominated from China, Nicaragua, Kenya, Myanmar, Pakistan and Kiribati, come from diplomatic and legal backgrounds. They include former Pakistan ambassadors to China Masood Khalid and Naghmana Alamgir Hashmi, attorney general of the Union of Myanmar Thida Oo and former International Criminal Court judge Joyce Aluoch from Kenya.