The IBA Asia Pacific Regional Forum, currently co-chaired by our Dispute Resolution partner Preetha Pillai together with Ramesh Vaidyanathan,  held its 7^th biennial conference in Singapore from 22^nd to 24^th February 2023.   
 
Over 300 lawyers from 190 law firms from across the globe participated at this conference which featured discussions on ESG, digital assets, privacy laws, asset recovery, legal policy in the use of economic sanctions, distressed debt opportunities, current developments in M&A and Asian trade agreements to name a few. Setting the tone was Chief Justice Sundaresh Menon who delivered the keynote address on the advent of the international courts and the vision for the Singapore International Commercial Courts.
 
Preetha co-chaired a session titled “Role of corporate counsel in managing cross-border litigation and arbitration disputes”, with Satyajit Gupta (EXL Service, New Delhi, Delhi) in which the very experienced panel of  James Berger (DLA Piper, New York City, New York), Gerald Kuppusamy (Senior Legal Counsel, Standard Chartered Bank, Singapore), Jayne Kuriakose (Head of Disputes & Litigation (Asia), DXC Technology, Singapore), Saqeb Mahbub (Mahbub & Co, Bangladesh), and Koh Swee Yen SC (WongPartnership, Singapore) discussed the dynamic relationship between inhouse counsel and external counsel when managing high stakes disputes.
 
Conference co-chairs were Ameera Ashraf (WongPartnership, Singapore; Diversity and Inclusion Officer, IBA Antitrust Section), Dinesh Dhillon (Allen & Gledhill, Singapore; Vice Chair, IBA Asia Pacific Regional Forum), and Masako Takahata (General Counsel, Industrial Decisions Inc, Tokyo; Webinar Officer, IBA Asia Pacific Regional Forum).