Law School Partnerships

Interest in legal education in the Gulf has attracted two prominent US law schools to form partnerships to develop legal education centers. In Dubai, Penn State Law announced an agreement with Dubai Judicial Institute, and in Qatar the Harvard Law School is working to develop a graduate law program to be located in Education City. The announcements indicate the clear need and good timing for enhanced legal education to serve the growing opportunities here in the GCC. Welcome! See the National Law Journal for more.

World Intellectual Property Organization depository libraries program at QU

I spent my first day back in the office hanging my degrees and opening mail. Two months of business is pending but manageable. One large box greeted me and I opened it to see seven books on intellectual property from WIPO. One of the things I want to do this month back as the QU law librarian is organize our WIPO depository material. Qatar University Libraries are part of the World Intellectual Property Organization depository libraries program. Materials include many monographs, reports, periodicals, electronic documents on CD/DVD delivered up on regular basis (essentially every new WIPO publication).

This is a task I discovered late last year but was unable to find time to understand the requirements of the depository program or propose a process. Luckily, I have some experience in UN materials as I was part of a depository UN library at NSU law library for some years in Florida. I also know it is time consuming.

I discovered in my first searches that 31 WIPO depository libraries have been created in 20 countries. I started searching for examples of WIPO organization at other libraries. For example, the National Library of Belarus is another WIPO library and is storing documents in a reading room dedicated to international organizations. In another example, Azerbaijan State Economic University joined WIPO’s depository libraries in 2012 and created a WIPO Reference Center. Both are good models.

Loving FCIL.

Back Home from Summer Vacation

My family and I are back in Qatar from the summer break and recovering from jetlag. We spent some weeks in Spain and a month in California. The kids will have some adventures to remember this summer. Here are a few pictures. Happy travels.

In Madrid

Gold Coast of Spain



Running in Barcelona



Walk of Fame, Hollywood





Law Librarian summer look





Hollywood

   



Candles in Barcelona









Birthday at the Souk

Some pictures from my 42nd birthday. Dinner at the Souq. Thanks!

Qatar Mall Fire

Qatar's posh Villagio Mall experienced a devastating fire this week claiming many dead and injured. This is a story that touches me deeply as my kids occasionally attended the nursery that burned. The fire claimed many toddlers and fine teachers. Two firefighters died trying to save the kids and many more were injured. My family participated in a remembrance vigil last night with about 100 others at the Pearl. Cherish your kids. Peace.

The First Issue of International Review of Law

At a press conference today Dr. Jon Truby, editor-in-chief of the new International Review of Law (IRL) based at QU College of Law, announced the availability of the IRL's first issue. The IRL is open access, bilingual in both English and Arabic, available electronically and soon in print. The focus of the IRL is international law topics not limited to a Qatari focus; for example one of the articles is on Hong Kong. All articles are published under a Creative Commons licence. QScience is the publisher and supported by the Qatar Foundation with the aim of bringing open access scholarship to the region. Many new Journals are being inaugurated at the QScience website developed with Bloomsbury.

The IRL Editorial Board is distinguished with The Right Honourable Lord Woolf of Barnes, PC (UK), Judge Sang-Hyun Song, President of the International Criminal Court (Netherlands), and H.E. Dr. Ali Bin Fetais Al Marri, Attorney General of the State of Qatar (Qatar) included.

I am glad to be part of this effort as the Citation Editor.

Here are some pictures from the press conference today:

  

Future Energy Summit

Congratulations to Dr. Rudiger Tscherning, Director Extraordinaire of the Energy and Environmental Law Forum on the upcoming Future Energy Summit that will take place next week.  

From the announcement: 

"The summit is dedicated to the question of renewable and nuclear energy as future energy mix options for the Middle East.  The conference will involve presentations by our invited experts and we have also scheduled a number of panel discussions on the following topics:

• Is Nuclear Energy the right fuel choice for the Middle-East?
• National and regional institutions on nuclear regulation and renewable energy promotion and regulation.
• The role of regional cooperation on future energy projects.
• Incentives and mechanisms to promote renewable energy in the Middle East.   

The Forum has secured the participation of a distinguished set of local and international legal, policy and financing experts from KACARE, the World Nuclear Association, IRENA, Qatar Petroleum, Kingdom University in Bahrain, Pinsent Masons LLP and Herbert Smith LLP.  Our regional experts will join us from Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain and we also have representatives from the Forum’s academic partners at the Energy Center in Austin/Texas and Southern Methodist University/Dallas joining us."