Matthew Gearing QC, a former co-head of Allen & Overy’s global arbitration group, and a former chair of the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre (HKIAC), is set to join Fountain Court Chambers on May 3.

In January, the UK’s Essex Court Chambers had announced that Gearing would be joining it. However, since then, Essex Court was sanctioned by the Chinese government over a Jan. 26 legal opinion penned by the four members of the chambers on the treatment of the Uyghur Muslim minority in Xinjiang.

Following the sanctions, all six lawyers who comprised Essex Court Chambers Duxton (Singapore Group Practice) left to set up a new practice.

Gearing is presently at Allen & Overy, where he spent more than two decades, becoming a partner in 2005. He took Silk in 2014.

Gearing specialises in global investment treaty and commercial arbitration, having represented corporate clients and sovereign states in arbitrations under the ICC, UNCITRAL, SIAC, HKIAC, KLRCA, SCC, LCIA and ICSID rules.

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