Delegations from around the world gather in Singapore this week for the signing of the UN’s Singapore Convention on Mediation. The driving force behind the convention is to assist international trade and promote mediation as an “alternative and effective method” of resolving trade disputes, according to the UN.

The aim is that an internationally-ratified framework will give businesses greater confidence to mediate cross-border disagreements rather than take them to court. A priority is to keep commercial disputes out of local courts, where litigation can be costly and there may be bias in favour of local operators. 

A mediation convention was proposed by the US in 2014, and its development assigned to a working group of the UN’s commission on international trade law. Timothy Schnabel, then a State Department attorney, headed the US delegation to the group.