The International Legal Issues Committee was established in late 2023 to:

1. Provide advice to the Board and President of the New Zealand Law Society on statements and submissions regarding international legal issues.
2. Support the Law Society to promote internationally the rule of law and access to justice.
3. Advise on the implications for the profession of international developments (including trade and business regulation impacting on lawyers).
4. Advise the Law Society on international law implications for law reform and advocacy.

Our people

The International Legal Issues Committee in convened by Frazer Barton, current President of the Law Society.

Elana Geddis is a barrister with Kate Sheppard Chambers and was previously a member of the New Zealand Law Society’s Public and Administrative Law Committee. Elana specialises in public and public international law and is a former diplomatic legal adviser with the NZ Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. She has appeared as counsel in the International Court of Justice, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, an UNCLOS Annex VII Tribunal and the New Zealand Supreme Court.

Gregor Allan is a barrister at Port Nicholson Chambers, Wellington, and Regional Chambers, Tauranga. He was previously a member of the Law Society’s Rule of Law Committee. Gregor has broad experience spanning public and transnational criminal litigation. He has also worked in academia in Australia and within government departments in New Zealand. From 2001 to 2004 Gregor was the Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions for Fiji, handling several sensitive cases, including constitutionally significant treason and mutiny related prosecutions arising from the Speight Coup of 2000.

Isaac Hikaka is a barrister at Mills Lane chambers and was previously a member of the New Zealand Law Society’s Rule of Law Committee. Isaac works frequently across the Pacific, particularly in the Cook Islands. He is a permanent member of the Cook Islands bar and has previously been admitted pro hoc vice in Samoa and Fiji. He has argued constitutional cases in all three jurisdictions. He has appeared as counsel before the Supreme Court, Privy Council and Court of Appeal of Samoa.

Tafaoimalo Tologata Professor Leilani Tuala-Warren is Dean of Te Piringa, Waikato University Faculty of Law and a former Justice of the Supreme Court of Samoa, where she navigated significant constitutional and rule of law issues. She is a Professor of Law at Te Whare Wānanga Waikato, the University of Waikato, and the first Pacific woman in Aotearoa to be appointed a Professor of Law. Tafaoimalo Tologata Professor Leilani had a similarly distinguished career prior to her appointment to the bench, as a state solicitor within the Attorney General of Samoa’s office, partner in a litigation firm, and Executive Director of the Samoa Law Reform Commission. She currently holds a temporary judicial warrant as a Supreme Court Justice of Samoa, which allows her to sit on the Samoa Court of Appeal.

Ex officio, the following are also members of the Committee:

• the convenor of the Public Law Committee (or their nominee(s))
• the convenor of the Human Rights and Privacy Committee (or their nominee(s))
• The Law Society’s nominee on the South Pacific Lawyers' Association.

Get in touch

For queries relating to this committee, please email Aimee Bryant, Manager Law Reform and Advocacy: aimee.bryant@lawsociety.org.nz

For media enquiries, please contact media@lawsociety.org.nz

Terms of reference