March 22, 2002
The speaker will discuss why the United States should promptly adhere to the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. He will also discuss the U.S. interests in the oceans, particularly our security interests, and why prompt adherence to the Convention is in the national interest.
John N. Moore the Walter L. Brown Professor of Law at the University of Virginia School of Law, directs the University's Center for National Security Law and the Center for Oceans Law & Policy. He was Director of the Graduate Law Program at Virginia for more than twenty years. Viewed by many as the founder of the field of national security law, Professor Moore chaired the prestigious American Bar Association's Standing Committee on Law and National Security for four terms. He is the author or editor of over twenty-five books and over 160 scholarly articles and served for two decades on the editorial board of the American Journal of International Law. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the American Law Institute, the American Society of International Law, the Order of the Coif, Phi Beta Kappa, and numerous other professional and honorary organizations. Professor Moore also has a distinguished record of public service. Among seven Presidential appointments, he has served two terms as the Senate-confirmed Chairman of the Board of Directors of the United States Institute of Peace and, as the first Chairman, set up this new agency. He also served as the Counselor on International Law to the Department of State, and as Ambassador and Deputy Special Representative of the President to the Law of the Sea Conference, Chairman of the NSC Interagency Task Force on the Law of the Sea, and as a member of the United States' legal team before the International Court of Justice in the Gulf of Maine and Nicaragua cases. Professor Moore currently serves as a member of the Director of Central Intelligence's Historical Review Board. In the recent past, he has served as a Consultant to both the President's Intelligence Oversight Board and the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. He has also been a member of the National Advisory Committee on Oceans and Atmosphere, the United States Delegation to the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe, and the Presidential Delegation of the United States to observe the elections in El Salvador. In 1990, he served, with the Deputy Attorney-General of the United States, as the Co-Chairman of the United States-USSR talks on the Rule of Law. He also served as the legal advisor to the Kuwait Representative to the United Nations Iraq-Kuwait Boundary Demarcation Commission.