Moderator: Sarah Malik – CEO of SOL International and International  Disputes Counsel
Panelists: Gary Born

Head of Rule of Law Business, LexisNexis Middle East 

Sarah Haddadi is the Head of Rule of Law and Deputy Head of the LexisNexis Middle East office. She studied Law at Paris La Sorbonne University and Assas University, where she completed a Master’s degree in Rule of Law and Lobbying. Before joining LexisNexis, Sarah worked in a prominent law firm in Paris, specialising in private law. She joined the LexisNexis team in 2015 and has been based in Dubai since 2016, where she manages the LexisNexis Rule of Law activity in the MENA region.

Chair of the International Arbitration Practice Group, Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP

Gary Born, Chair of the International Arbitration Practice Group at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP, is one of the world’s preeminent authorities on international commercial arbitration and international litigation. He has served as counsel in over 650 arbitrations, including several of the most prominent arbitrations in ICC and ad hoc history. He has sat as an arbitrator in over 200 institutional and ad hoc arbitrations. Mr Born is President of the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) Court of Arbitration and serves in an advisory capacity in other institutions worldwide. He is a member of the American Law Institute and of the Board of Trustees of the British Institute for International and Comparative Law. He has served on the Executive Council of the American Society of International Law, the Advisory Committee of the ALI’s Restatement of US International Arbitration Law, the Advisory Committee of the ALI Restatement of US Foreign Relation Law (Fourth) and as co-chair of the ABA International Section, Committee on International Aspects of Litigation.

CEO of SOL International and International Disputes Counsel

Sarah Malik is an award-winning lawyer who achieved Litigator of the Year (2022) at the first GCC Women in Law Awards and received an honourable mention in the ‘Law Firm Leader of the Year’ category at the same awards.

In March 2022, SOL was named by Legal 500 EMEA as a ‘Firm to Watch in Dispute Resolution: Arbitration and International Litigation’. Sarah and SOL have been further nominated as Women Lawyer of the Year and Rising Law Firm of the Year. She is a member of the SIAC Users Council in the Middle East and is appointed to the Lagos Panel of Arbitration Neutrals. Sarah is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators and accepts appointments to sit as an Arbitrator. She undertakes international commercial arbitrations as Counsel (DIAC, ADCCAC, DIFC-LCIA, ICC) and practices commercial litigation at the DIFC and ADGM Courts.

At the end of 2019, she authored “A Guide to GCC Arbitration”, published by LexisNexis and in 2018, she authored “The UAE Chapter on Arbitration in the International Comparative Legal Guide”. Sarah is regularly invited to speak worldwide on arbitration, including for the ICC, CIArb and IBA.

Director of the Cairo Regional Centre for International Commercial Arbitration (CRCICA)
President of the International Federation of Commercial Arbitration Institutions (IFCAI)
Chairman of the Egypt Branch of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (CIArb)
Vice-President of the African Arbitration Association (AfAA)

In 2009, Dr. Selim earned his PhD with highest honors from Université de Bourgogne. In 2001, he obtained his masters in Public Administration from ENA.
He began his legal career as a prosecutor and judge (1998-2009) before joining private practice as partner in reputable law firms (2009 -2016).
Dr Selim teaches Private International Law, Arbitration and ADR at Ecole de Droit de la Sorbonne au Caire (Paris I University), since 2011 and teaches Comparative International Arbitration Law. He is also a tutor on the CIArb Approved Faculty List.

Dr Selim is consistently appointed as Arbitrator in various ad hoc and institutional cases under various rules, and has served as legal expert on Egyptian, Libyan and Kuwaiti laws in International proceedings.
Dr. Selim has been recognized as a leading individual in Legal 500 (2016) and as one of the best specialists in arbitration law in Egypt in WWL (2023).

Dr. Selim is a certified mediator at London School of Mediation.
Dr Selim speaks Arabic, French, and English fluently as well as basic Chinese.

Dr. Dalia Hussein is the Deputy Director of CRCICA, the Vice Chair and Honorary Secretary General of the CIArb Egypt Branch, Adjunct Professor at the Law Department, the American University of Cairo.
She has over 20 years of experience in international commercial and investment arbitration. Before joining CRCICA, she worked as prosecutor then as counsel in an international arbitration law firm based in Cairo where she represented states and private parties in domestic and international commercial and investment disputes. She taught business and contract Law at the French and British universities in Egypt, commercial and investment arbitration at the the Institut de Droit des Affaires Internationales at Cairo University and at the French Law Section at Ain Shams University. She also worked as an external legal expert for Arab and Islamic Laws at the Swiss Institute of Comparative Law.

Dr. Hussein serves as arbitrator and published a number of articles and book chapters in Arabic, English and French.

She holds a Maîtrise en Droit from Paris I-Pantheon-Sorbonne University, an LL.B. from Cairo University, an LL.M. in International Law from Paris II-Pantheon-Assas University, an LL.M in Private Law from Cairo University, a PHD in international arbitration from Cairo University.

Partner, Regional Head of Dispute Resolution

Dr Hassan Arab is a leading expert in all aspects of civil and commercial litigation, arbitration, ADR, recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments and arbitral awards. He has spent his career building one of the strongest dispute resolution team in the Middle East which Legal 500 has recognised as “having a great reputation for local court work with a number of really good practitioners”. He continues to be known as a key name in Legal 500 (2024).
Chambers Global has commended Hassan Arab as a “real winner who gives excellent advice and solutions”. He has been recognised as an Eminent Practitioner in the UAE Dispute Resolution category for Chambers Global and has been ranked for the last 17 years. He is also ranked in Who’sWho Legal for a number of years, which include his latest rankings in 2024 as a recommended lawyer in three different practices: Arbitration, Commercial Litigation and Asset Recovery.
Dr Arab has been appointed as a Court of Arbitration member in the Abu Dhabi International Arbitration Centre (arbitrateAD). He is frequently appointed as an arbitrator under the major arbitral institutions and is regularly invited to speak and publish on the many aspects of litigation, arbitration, and dispute resolution in the Middle East.
Dr Arab has written and lectured extensively on various topics which include arbitration, dispute resolution, enforcement of judgments, specialised court and committees in UAE. He has also authored several books and articles.