The opening session commenced at 9:00 AM, with an opening remark from the Ambassador Abdel Rahman Al Soleh - the Director of the Arab League Center for Legal and Judicial Research which was followed by a second opening remark held by Mr. Philipp Bremer - the head of the Rule of Law Program Middle East and North Africa in the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung.

Afterwards, the seminar was divided into two panels:

The First Panel: The Difference between Disqualification Requests and a judge’s stepdown (practical cases from Jordan, Iraq, Egypt, Mauritania and Morocco)

The first panel consisted of Judge Mohamed El Chayeb (Head of the first instance court of Al Kark, Jordan), Judge Naser Saadoun (Overlooking judge in the judicial overlooking committee, Iraq), Judge Dr. Toufic Ibrahim (Vice president of the Cassation Court, Egypt), Judge Al Talba Al Haj (Judge at the Higher Judiciary Court, Mauritania) and Judge Younes Al Zahri (Judge, Morocco). This panel was moderated by Dr. Youssef Al Sebaawi (Vice president of the Arab League Center for Legal and Judicial Research).

This panel tackled the respective experiences of the above-mentioned Arab countries when it comes to disqualification requests. In addition, the speakers tried to highlight how their respective civil procedural laws are limiting the misuse of legal complaints.

The Second Panel: The Lebanese Case under the Civil Procedural Law - Theoretical and Practical Perspective

The second panel consisted of Judge Ghaleb Ghanem (former head of the Lebanese Supreme Judicial Council), Professor Helmi El Hajjar (legal writer and university lecturer) and Professor Ibrahim El Najjar (former minister of Justice), who moderated this panel, which was followed by concluding remarks from Judge Elias Richa (secretary general of the Lebanese Supreme Judicial Council)

This panel discussed the Lebanese situation highlighting specifically the investigation related to the Beirut port explosion.

Both panels were followed by Q&A time.