Alvin Tan and Rebecca Tan from the Department of Political Science recently participated in the International Committee of Red Cross (ICRC) International Humanitarian Law Debate 2012 organised by the Faculty of Law, Universiti Teknologi MARA in Shah Alam, Malaysia, in conjunction with the International Committee of Red Cross. This year, both students secured top honours for the Faculty and Department by winning the 2012 Championship.
After eight gruelling preliminary rounds, two NUS teams, Alvin and Rebecca were in the winning team,emerged as the top two teams of the tournament. This is an unprecedented feat in the history of the tournament. On top of emerging as the Champions of the tournament, Alvin was also the best speaker of the tournament for the second consecutive year running, which was no mean feat. Rebecca was named the 9th best speaker of the tournament, and the best speaker of the Grand Finals. This tournament was started in 2008 and since then, teams from NUS have won it three times out of five (2008, 2011 and 2012).For Alvin and Rebecca, their achievements this year are made extra special due to the clean sweep by NUS of all the major honours – Best Speaker of Tournament, Best Speaker of Finals and Champions.
Alvin feels the ICRC IHL Championship provided an excellent platform for reasoned discourse on the topic of international humanitarian law with other top young minds from the region, and was an opportunity that he could not afford to pass up. However, the primary reason for his participation in the tournament was to defend NUS’s title hold as Champions. NUS is unquestionably the debate powerhouse of Southeast Asia right now, and as a final year NUS student, this was his final opportunity to repay back to a university that offered him so much in the way of opportunities for learning and self actualization.
