St John's College (The University of Hong Kong)

Eloquent St. Johnians Lead the World in Moot Court Competition

Achieving the highest international standards of mooting advocacy and academic excellence in public international law, the Hong Kong Team was ranked third in this year’s Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition. Among the 5 HKU representatives two are St. Johnians. They are 8/F Enoch Li (LLB Year 4) and 1/F Adrian Leung Hay-yin (PCLL). 94 teams from 80 countries, which emerged as champion teams of their region from 529 schools from over 85 countries, gathered in Washington in March to participate in this prestigious international mooting competition. “We were required to respond to a hypothetical legal problem with oral and written arguments presented in a courtroom simulation,” explained Adrian, “This is what we call mooting.” Our fellow St. Johnians devoted great efforts to prepare for the competition. “In the month before leaving for Washington, we stayed in the library till 11 p.m. every night to research the related legal literatures,” said Enoch, “Luckily the efforts paid off.” The HK team was also awarded the Second Place Award in the Alona E. Evans Best Memorial Competition and the Third Place Award in the Hardy Dillard Memorial Prize. The team members shared a scholarship awarded by a prestigious set of barristers’ chambers for their impressive achievement. Besides adequate beforehand preparation, Enoch and Adrian have been demonstrating eloquent debating skills since they were prominent debaters in their secondary schools, Diocesan Girls’ School and St. Joseph College respectively. Both of them joined the English Debating Team of the university and became stage speakers afterwards. Enoch served as the captain of the university team as well, and led the team to championship in the Joint University Debating Competition in 2003. With extraordinary exposure and outstanding contributions to the university, they are leaving HKU this year with bright future prospect. “I will work in the International Criminal Court at the Hague this summer,” said Enoch, while Adrian is awarded a prestigious scholarship to pursue his study of LLM in Britain. We wish Enoch and Adrian all the best in the future.