Final year UQ TC Beirne School of Law student Matthew Tsai was recently highly commended in an international competition that has been dubbed ‘the junior Nobel Prize’, the Undergraduate Awards.
The award, which recognises excellent research and original work across the sciences, humanities, business and creative arts, this year attracted 5514 submissions from around the world.
Mr Tsai’s paper, Finding accountability in complicity: The El-Masri story of Third States, International Adjudication and Enforced Disappearances under International Law analysed a decision of the European Court of Human Rights addressing the responsibility of a European State for participating in the “extraordinary rendition” of the US program.
It also explored how the European Court of Human Rights could find the US had breached international law when it was not a party to the European Convention on Human Rights.
Mr Tsai thanked Public International Law lecturer, Professor Anthony Cassimatis for his support which was “above and beyond”.
“The paper was based on the assignment he set in the course and I was able to incorporate his feedback before I submitted it,” he said. “Professor Cassimatis is a great lecturer who takes the time to provide quality feedback on every student’s assignment.”
Mr Tsai was also in the UQ team who were runners-up in the Australia New Zealand Air Law Moot Competition earlier this month in Auckland, which also focused on international law.
Following graduation this year he plans to move to Sydney to work at Ernst & Young in tax law.
“I would like to maintain an active interest in research while working in the private sector,” he said.
