Alfred H.A. Soons

Fred Soons studied law at Utrecht University, The Netherlands, followed by postgraduate studies in international law at the University of Washington (Seattle, USA) and Cambridge University (UK). He obtained a PhD-degree at Utrecht University with a thesis in the field of the international law of the sea in 1982.

After having served from 1976 as a civil servant in various legal and policy positions at the Netherlands Ministry of Transport, Water Management and Public Works, he became professor of public international law and director of the Netherlands Institute for the Law of the Sea (NILOS) at Utrecht University in 1987. He retired from these positions in 2014.

He was, inter alia, a deputy-judge at the Rotterdam District Court, member and chairman of the Advisory Committee on Public International Law of the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, a Founding Co-director of the Rhodes Academy of Oceans Law and Policy, President of the Royal Netherlands Society of International Law, Director of Studies of the International Law Association, chairman of the Scientific Advisory Council of the Netherlands Defense Academy, member of the Advisory Body of Experts on the Law of the Sea of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC/ABE-LOS), and Adjunct Professor of International Law at the University of Curaçao. He is a member of the Institut de Droit International.

As counsel and arbitrator he has been involved in international litigation at the International Court of Justice, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea and arbitral tribunals.