Biography
Arif Hyder Ali is a globally ranked and recognized lawyer with over 30 years of experience in international dispute settlement, including investor-State and international commercial arbitration, state-to-state disputes, and cross-border litigation. He is currently the Co-Chair of Dechert LLP’s International Arbitration and Public International Law Group. He has served as lead trial counsel and arbitrator (sole, party-appointed, presiding) in arbitrations under all the major arbitral regimes and the laws of over 50 civil and common law jurisdictions, as well as Islamic law and public international law. He has also held positions at leading academic institutions (Georgetown University Law Center, University of Dundee’s Centre for Energy, Mineral Law, and Policy) as an adjunct law professor, honorary lecturer and global faculty member. He has worked as a senior lawyer in two international organizations: from 1993 to 1996, he was a Section Chief at the United Nations Compensation Commission, a subsidiary organ of the United Nations Security Council, and from 2000 to 2001, he served as Senior Counsel at the World Intellectual Property Organization Arbitration and Mediation Center.
Mr. Ali has been decorated by the King of Bahrain with the Order of Bahrain (II) for his role in Bahrain’s successful representation before the International Court of Justice (Maritime Delimitation and Territorial Questions between Qatar and Bahrain (Qatar v. Bahrain)). For over two decades, he has been ranked by market-leading directories (Chambers, Legal 500, Who’s Who Legal, Global Arbitration Review and The Best Lawyers in America) as one of the world’s leading arbitration practitioners. Amongst many of his recognitions, he is a recipient of Law 360’s MVP Award (awarded to lawyers who have distinguished by securing hard-earned successes in high-stakes disputes and complex global matters), the Minority Corporate Counsel Association’s 2021 Rainmaker Award (awarded to those who have achieved sustained success through innovation, and demonstrated a deep commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion, and an extraordinary commitment to the community), BTI’s 2021 Client Service All-Star Award (awarded to those who show continuous commitment to delivering the best levels of client service), and the Financial Times’ 2021 Award for Most Innovative Legal Practitioner in North America (awarded for having won a string of high stakes and cutting-edge international arbitrations).
Mr. Ali has published more than 50 articles relating to international arbitration and public international law, and is the lead author of several books, including The International Arbitration Rulebook: A Practitioner’s Guide (2019, 713 pages, WoltersKluwer); Investment Protection in International Banking and Finance (2021, 650 pages, WoltersKluwer); and Protección Inversiones Españolas (2017, 140 pages, Thompson Reuters Aranzadi).
Mr. Ali received his B.A. in Political Science, summa cum laude, from Columbia University in 1986, when he was also elected to the Phi Beta Kappa Honors Society. He earned his Juris Doctor degree from New York University School of Law in 1990 where he was awarded the Vanderbilt Medal. He is a member of bars of the District of Columbia and New York, and a Registered Foreign Lawyer of England and Wales. His working languages are English, Spanish and French. He is conversant in Urdu, Bangla, Hindi and Portuguese.