
The Australian Institute of International Affairs and the Australian Branch of the International Law Association call for applications for the 2026 Peter Nygh Hague Conference Internship.
Awarded annually, the Nygh internship offers a postgraduate student or graduate of an Australian law school the exciting opportunity to undertake a 6-month internship with The Hague Conference on Private International Law, in the Netherlands.
The successful applicant will have the chance to work with some of the world’s leading private international law practitioners and will receive funding to assist with travel costs and living expenses.
Previous Nygh interns have worked on projects in fields including: family law; evidence and access to justice; cross border flow of personal data; migration; civil liability for trans-boundary harm and commercial dispute resolution. For many interns, the opportunity to observe the negotiation of an international convention first-hand has been a highlight of their internship, all whilst living and working in the Netherlands.
English, French and Spanish are the three working languages of the Hague Conference and Australian law graduates and final year law students with French and/or Spanish language skills are encouraged to apply for the internship.
The Peter Nygh Hague Conference Internship was established in memory of the late Hon Dr Peter Nygh AM, a renowned international lawyer and former judge of the Family Court of Australia.
Applications for the 2026 Nygh Internship have been extended to close on 14 August 2025. For further information and application instructions visit: Peter Nygh Hague Conference Internship – Australian Institute of International Affairs or email Nicola Nygh at nicola.nygh@rllawyers.com.au
The following announcement was kindly shared with us by Fabienne Jault-Seseke
Created with the support of LexisNexis, the Review Perspectives contentieuses internationales (PCI) is a biannual academic journal dedicated to the globalization of international litigation in both its public and private aspects. Each issue features a thematic dossier, complemented by several articles outside the main topic (Varia), as well as brief focus pieces addressing current events relevant to political or regulatory developments impacting international disputes (Focus).
The editorial committee, which ensures the scientific and operational direction of the Review, is composed of Sandrine Clavel, Patrick Jacob, and Fabienne Jault-Seseke (professors at Université Paris-Saclay, UVSQ).
Three issues have already been published and are available open access.
Issue 3 was released a few weeks ago.
It features a dossier dedicated to the Real Madrid / Le Monde case, following the decisions of the Court of Justice and the French Court of Cassation. Articles in this dossier were written by Fabienne Jault-Seseke, Julie Traullé, Marie Dugué and Laura Vitale, Ana Quinones, Olivera Boskovic, and Fabien Marchadier.
The issue also contains an article in English by Gilles Cuniberti on the international attractiveness of specialized commercial courts: “Assessing the International Attractiveness of Commercial Courts: Will Paris Eat London’s Lunch?”
A recent decision by the French Court of Cassation enabled Marylou Françoise to write a study devoted to the seising of the Judge in International Disputes.”
The issue concludes with presentations of:
A new volume coming out of the Programme in European Private Law for Postgraduates (PEPP) has just been published as part of the Scritti di diritto privato europeo ed internazionale series.
The table of contents can be found here; the full volume is available open access here.
Conventions & Instruments
On 1 July 2025:
On 5 July 2025, the 1970 Evidence Convention entered into force for the Philippines. The Convention currently has 69 Contracting Parties. More information is available here.
On 24 July 2025, the Republic of Moldova acceded to the 1970 Evidence Convention. The Convention currently has 69 Contracting Parties. More information is available here.
Publications
On 22 July 2025, the Permanent Bureau announced the publication of the fifth editions of the Practical Handbooks on the Operation of the 1965 Service and 1970 Evidence Conventions. Incorporating recent developments, court decisions, and practical examples provided by experts from around the world, as well as updates from the meeting of the Special Commission held in July 2024, the fifth editions of the Handbooks are essential resources for anyone involved in the implementation and operation of the 1965 Service and 1970 Evidence Conventions. More information is available here.
Meetings & Events
On 10 July 2025, the Permanent Bureau of the HCCH and the Asian Business Law Institute co-hosted the webinar “Cross-border Commercial Dispute Resolution – Electronic Service of Documents and Remote Taking of Evidence”. More information is available here.
On 11 July 2025, the first meeting of the Working Group dedicated to the Model Forms for Chapter II of the 1970 Evidence Convention was held online, hosted by the Permanent Bureau. More information is available here.
Other Developments
On 9 July 2025, the premises of the HCCH’s Regional Office for Africa, hosted by the Kingdom of Morocco, were officially opened in Rabat. More information is available here.
On 10 July 2025, the Permanent Bureau of the HCCH announced several developments with regard to the HCCH’s International Child Abduction Database (INCADAT), including the launch of its new notification service. More information is available here.
These monthly updates are published by the Permanent Bureau of the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH), providing an overview of the latest developments. More information and materials are available on the HCCH website.
We are delighted to announce that Wilson Lui will be joining our Editorial Board. Wilson holds degrees from the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, the Chinese University of Hong Kong and the University of Hong Kong. He currently teaches at the University of Hong Kong while working towards his PhD at the University of Melbourne. His many publications include a comprehensive volume on the conflict of laws in Hong Kong, Hong Kong Private International Law (Hart 2025; together with Anselmo Reyes).
At the same time, we are sad to see Samuel Fulli-Lemaire (Université de Strasbourg), David P. Stewart (Georgetown University), and Marlene Wethmar-Lemmer (University of South Africa) retire from the blog after years of service to this project – we are all the more grateful for their contributions and wish them all the best.
Written by Hadrien Pauchard (assistant researcher and doctoral student at Sciences Po Law School)
The second issue of the Revue Critique de droit international privé of 2025 has just been released. It contains four articles, seven case notes and numerous book reviews. In line with the Revue Critique’s recent policy, the doctrinal part will soon be made available in English on the editor’s website (for registered users and institutions).
The issue opens with Dr. Delphine Porcheron’s (Université de Strasbourg) in-depth study of Les actions transnationales en réparation de crimes internationaux commis par un État : l’émergence d’un nouveau contentieux (Transnational reparation claims for international crimes committed by States: the emergence of a new form of litigation). At the crossroads of public and private international law, the contribution discusses the lessons learned from emblematic cases rendered across multiple jurisdictions. Its abstract reads as follows:
In light of the limited availability of international judicial remedies for individuals and the inadequacy of existing compensation schemes, victims of international crimes attributable to a State increasingly seek redress through domestic courts. These transnational claims for reparation are on the rise and have generated a new category of litigation, raising complex legal questions. An emerging trend in favor of the admissibility of such actions before national courts calls for a re-examination of the relationship between different branches of law and highlights the evolving role of private international law in this context.
The second article by Prof. Rebecca Legendre (Université Paris Nanterre) untangles recent controversies on Le droit international privé à l’épreuve de la gestation pour autrui (Private international law facing surrogacy). The treatment of foreign surrogacy in prohibitive legal orders such as France raises serious legal debates, recently fuelled by several important rulings by the French Supreme Court which the present contribution analyses:
For over fifteen years, surrogacy has posed a persistent challenge to private international law. The most recent case law from France’s Cour de Cassation underscores this tension with striking clarity. The decisions handed down in October and November 2024 introduce significant developments to the field: the weakening of a substantive international public policy which is stripped of its essence, a procedural public policy distorted in service of substantive aims, a softening of the principle prohibiting review of the merits of foreign judgments, and the neutralisation of sanctions for fraud. Yet, upon closer examination, private international law appears ill-equipped to provide satisfactory solutions. It is by moving beyond its traditional boundaries—drawing instead on the framework of fundamental rights, and particularly on the principle of proportionality—that more viable and equitable answers may be found in the future.
In the third contribution, Dr. Georgette Salamé (Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne) and Dr. Guillaume Kessler (Université Savoie Mont Blanc) share thoughtful Réflexions sur l’accueil du sexe neutre en droit international privé (A propos de la décision du Tribunal fédéral suisse du 8 juin 2023) (Reflections on the Legal Recognition of a Third Sex Category in Private International Law (in light of the Swiss Supreme Federal Court’s decision of June 8, 2023)). Its abstract reads as follows:
The decision issued by the Swiss Supreme Federal Court on June 8, 2023, relates to the recognition of gender neutrality in binary legal systems. The Court ruled that a Swiss female citizen that had exercised in Germany the option to leave her gender designation blank in public registers, may not avail herself of such status to claim the same in Switzerland. The decision is remarkable considering the recent developments of private international law and therefore requires thorough assessment of its legal grounds. Moreover, it prompts a prospective study of the possible recognition in France of intersex individuals’ claims to a neutral gender registration in instances where such claims are based on a foreign judgment or foreign public document. It finally calls for an examination of considerations that argue for or against the recognition of a neutral gender in France from the standpoint of private international law; the analysis addresses the ongoing evolution of international public policy and the degree to which the legal categories of the forum can be reinterpreted and adapted.
The doctrinal part of the issue wraps up with Prof. Maxime Barba’s (Université Grenobles Alpes) essay on Les impératifs de concentration en matière d’exequatur des jugements (Concentration imperatives in matters of judgements’ exequatur). Tackling a major procedural issue that is playing an increasingly important role in transnational disputes, the contribution’s abstract reads as follows:
In a world where judgements circulate more and more freely, the exact place of concentration imperatives needs to be determined. Can a party initiate a new indirect proceeding by changing its pleas? Can a party assert, in the requested forum, pleas and claims omitted in the original forum? These are just some of the questions now facing French and European judges, who are taking their time, hesitating and, sometimes, contradicting each other. The aim of this contribution is to present the various solutions currently in force, and to suggest ways in which they might be developed – modified or generalized –, with a view to enabling jurisprudence to step up and improve its normative approach to these delicate issues.
The full table of contents will be available here.
Previous issues of the Revue Critique (from 2010 to 2022) are available on Cairn.
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