The International Bar Association (IBA) Annual Conference is the premier conference for legal professionals worldwide to meet, share knowledge, network, build contacts and develop business. It serves to advance the development of international law and its role in business and society and to provide members with world-class professional development opportunities to enable them to deliver outstanding legal services.
The IBA’s first Annual Conference was held in 1947 and it has grown to become the world’s largest and most prestigious international gathering of lawyers, attracting over 6,000 delegates in 2016 representing over 2,700 law firms, corporations, governments and regulators.
The 2017 IBA Annual Conference in Sydney will feature around 200 conference sessions. These vary widely in style and, with the core substantive committee sessions at the heart of the conference programme covering most sectors and practice areas, the conference will provide the opportunity to focus on your own areas of interest.
The IBA Annual Conference attracts many distinguished speakers who in recent years have included: Kofi Annan, former UN SecretaryGeneral ; Jose Maria Aznar, former President of Spain; José Manuel Barroso, former European Commission President; Fatou Bensouda, International Criminal Court Chief Prosecutor; Anders Fogh Rasmussen, former Secretary-General of NATO and Prime Minister of Denmark; Jeh Johnson, former United States Secretary of Homeland Security (2011-2017); Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund; Loretta E Lynch, former Attorney General of the United States (2011-2017); Robert S Mueller III, former Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation; and General Colin L Powell, former US Secretary of State.
