Board of Trustees (BoT)

CRCICA has a Board of Trustees (BoT) consisting of ten (10) members at least and thirty (30) members at the most appointed in consultation with AALCO from amongst eminent African and Asian personalities specialized in the fields of international arbitration, law, business, trade, investment and international relations.

The BoT may include up to 20% of its members from outside the Afro-Asian Region from amongst figures specialized in the aforementioned fields. The composition of CRCICA’s current Board of Trustees is showed below.

The term of the BoT is four years, which may be renewed once for a similar term, unless otherwise determined due to special circumstances. The BoT carries out the functions provided for in the By-laws of the Board of Trustees. This includes meeting once a year to oversee CRCICA’s caseload and in particular the following functions:

  1. Appointing the Director of the Centre in consultation with AALCO for a four-year term, which may be renewed once for a similar term, unless otherwise determined due to special circumstances;
  2.  Setting down the general policy for achieving the objectives of the Centre; and
  3. Ratifying the Auditor’s report for each fiscal year.

nayla

Prof. Dr. Nayla Comair-Obeid

Professor Nayla Comair-Obeid is the founding partner of “Obeid & Partners” (Dubai, Paris & Beirut) and heads the firm’s dispute resolution practice since 1987. Her areas of expertise range from international business law and Islamic and Middle Eastern legislation to franchising, shareholder issues, licensing, banking, insurance, intellectual property, technology, telecommunication, construction, energy and natural resources, and corporate and financial disputes.

Professor Comair-Obeid has been identified amongst the world’s foremost arbitrator practitioners, and has been actively involved in more than 170 international commercial and investment arbitrations as well as domestic arbitrations as a party appointed arbitrator, chairperson, sole arbitrator, counsel and expert in Arabic, French and English languages. She has been nominated Arbitrator Intelligence’s Presiding Arbitrator of the Year for 2020.

Throughout her career, Professor Comair-Obeid has held and continues to hold pre-eminent positions in many of the major international arbitration institutions. She has been recently elected the Vice Chair of the ICC (as of June 2022) and has been a member of the ICC Executive Board since 2019. She has also been recently appointed the Chair of the Jury of the ICC Institute Prize (2023 edition) and is a member of the Council of the ICC Institute of World Business Law.

Additionally, Professor Comair-Obeid is currently a trustee of the Cairo Regional Center for International Commercial Arbitration, the Vice Chair of the Arbitration Committee in the International Bar Association, member of the ICCA Governing Board, and Board Member of Women’s Leadership Board of the Women and Public Policy Program (WAPPP) at the Harvard Kennedy School, amongst others.

Professor Comair-Obeid has authored numerous publications in Arabic, French and English covering a range of legal fields and is frequently invited to speak as a leading expert in her field.

Prof. Comair-Obeid has taught as Professor of International Commercial Arbitration at the Lebanese University, University of Pantheon-Assas Paris II, and as Lecturer for the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators, University of Oxford. She obtained her PhD in Business Law from the University Paris II, Panthéon-Assas (1994).

Professor Comair-Obeid is a member of the Beirut Bar and the Paris Bar. She is also an Associate Member at 3VB Barristers Chambers in London.