Bimal Patel Sworn In as a Judge of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea at Hamburg
Indian international-law scholar Bimal N. Patel, Vice-Chancellor of Rashtriya Raksha University, Gandhinagar, was sworn in as a judge of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) at its seat in Hamburg, Germany, on 1 October 2026. ITLOS was created under the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) and has 21 members elected by states parties for nine-year terms, adjudicating disputes over maritime boundaries, navigation, fisheries and the deep seabed. Patel has served on India's National Security Advisory Board and in the UN International Law Commission, and succeeds Neeru Chadha as India's judge on the tribunal.
UNCLOS was adopted in 1982, entered into force in 1994 and is often called the 'Constitution for the Oceans' | UNCLOS fixes the territorial sea at 12 nautical miles, the contiguous zone at 24 and the Exclusive Economic Zone at 200 nautical miles | ITLOS sits at Hamburg, Germany, while the International Court of Justice is a separate body seated at The Hague