What is the eligibility level for participants in the Opening Round Championship Series?

The competition is open to college-level participants, as indicated by the eligibility level.

Where is the Opening Round Championship Series held?

The event takes place in Hamilton, USA, specifically in the city of Hamilton.

Opening Round Championship Series

Mar 14–15, 2026Hamilton, United StatesIn-person

ConcludedRegistration closed

The Opening Round Championship Series is a collegiate-level mock trial competition held in Hamilton, USA. This event serves as a crucial stage for college teams to advance in the national mock trial circuit, showcasing their legal understanding and courtroom advocacy skills. Participants engage in simulated trials, taking on roles as attorneys and witnesses, and are judged on their performance in presenting cases and cross-examining opponents.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 1 countries stand on the dominant committee topic. Click through for the full country profile.

United States

The USA is the host nation for this collegiate mock trial competition, providing the foundational legal framework and educational institutions that participate.

Role in topic

As the host country, the USA provides the legal and educational infrastructure for the competition. The event is a key part of the American collegiate mock trial system, fostering legal education and advocacy skills among university students across the nation.

Topics & background

The history behind each committee topic and the states that shape it.

Reaffirming the Global Commitment to Eliminating Anti-Personnel Landmines

Anti-personnel landmines emerged as a defining humanitarian arms-control issue in the 1990s, when post-Cold War conflicts in Cambodia, Angola, Mozambique, Bosnia, and elsewhere revealed the devastating long-term consequences of mines that continued to maim and kill civilians decades after fighting ended. A coalition of NGOs, led by the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL), worked with sympathetic states to produce the 1997 Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on Their Destruction, known as the Ottawa Treaty, which entered into force in 1999. The treaty now has more than 160 states parties and has driven significant reductions in stockpiles, production, and casualties. Despite this progress, major military powers including the United States, Russia, China, India, and Pakistan have not joined the convention, and non-state armed groups continue to use improvised mines in conflicts from Myanmar to the Sahel. The war in Ukraine has produced one of the most heavily mined territories on earth, and in 2024-2025 several frontline European states began signaling withdrawal from or reconsideration of Ottawa commitments, citing the Russian threat. Casualty figures tracked by the Landmine Monitor have risen in recent years, with civilians — and children in particular — making up the overwhelming majority of victims. The committee must consider how to reinforce the Ottawa norm against erosion, expand universalization to non-signatory states, accelerate mine clearance and victim assistance funding, and address the proliferation of improvised explosive devices that function as de facto landmines in contemporary conflict.

Key players

Prohibiting the Targeting of Civilians and Non-Combatants by Armed Drones

Armed unmanned aerial vehicles moved from niche capability to central instrument of warfare over the past two decades. The United States pioneered targeted killing by drone in counterterrorism operations across Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, and Afghanistan after 2001, generating sustained controversy over civilian casualties, sovereignty, and the legal basis for strikes outside declared armed conflict. Turkish, Iranian, Israeli, and Chinese drones have since proliferated to dozens of state and non-state users, and the conflicts in Nagorno-Karabakh, Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan, and Ethiopia have demonstrated drones as decisive battlefield tools — and as sources of significant civilian harm. International humanitarian law already prohibits the deliberate targeting of civilians, requires distinction and proportionality, and demands feasible precautions in attack; these rules apply to drones as they do to any weapon. The dispute is over implementation: opaque targeting criteria, signature strikes, loitering munitions launched by non-state actors, automated target recognition, and strikes on humanitarian convoys, hospitals, and journalists. UN special rapporteurs have repeatedly called for transparency standards and accountability mechanisms for drone strikes, while exporting states have resisted binding new rules. Delegates must weigh whether existing IHL is sufficient if properly enforced, or whether a dedicated instrument on armed drones — covering transfer controls, transparency, investigation of civilian harm, and limits on autonomy in targeting — is needed to close gaps that asymmetric warfare has exposed.

Key players

Reducing Global Trade Tensions and Lowering Tariff and Non-Tariff Barriers

The post-1995 World Trade Organization order rested on binding tariff commitments, most-favored-nation treatment, and a functioning dispute settlement system. That consensus has steadily frayed. The US-China tariff war that began in 2018 introduced sweeping Section 301 duties, prompted retaliation, and normalized the use of tariffs as instruments of strategic competition. The WTO Appellate Body has been paralyzed since 2019 owing to a US block on new judges, weakening the multilateral enforcement architecture. Industrial policy programs — the US Inflation Reduction Act and CHIPS Act, the EU Green Deal Industrial Plan and Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, and China's export controls on critical minerals — have multiplied non-tariff measures justified on climate, security, or resilience grounds. In 2025, a new wave of US tariffs, including broad reciprocal duties and sector-specific measures on steel, autos, and semiconductors, triggered countermeasures from China, the EU, Canada, and others, and sharply slowed projected global trade growth according to IMF and WTO assessments. Developing economies face compounding pressures from subsidy competition they cannot match, supply-chain reshoring that bypasses them, and the erosion of preferential access. The committee is tasked with rebuilding political support for open, rules-based trade: restoring functional dispute settlement, disciplining harmful subsidies and export restrictions, addressing legitimate concerns about overcapacity and labor and environmental standards, and ensuring that the green and digital transitions do not become pretexts for protectionism.

Key players

Mitigating the Impact of Artificial Intelligence and Automation on Workers Worldwide

Successive waves of automation have reshaped labor markets, but the rapid diffusion of generative AI since 2022 has accelerated concern about disruption to white-collar work, creative industries, and service sectors that prior automation largely spared. IMF and ILO analyses estimate that around 40 percent of jobs globally are exposed to AI, with advanced economies facing both higher exposure and higher complementarity, and developing economies risking being left behind in the productivity gains. Platform-mediated and algorithmically managed work — from ride-hail to data labeling to content moderation — has already produced documented patterns of low pay, surveillance, and precarious conditions, often performed by workers in the Global South for firms headquartered in the Global North. The policy response remains fragmented. The EU AI Act, adopted in 2024, includes workplace provisions; the ILO has issued guidance on platform work and is negotiating a possible convention on decent work in the platform economy; UNESCO has issued ethical AI recommendations; and the UN Global Digital Compact agreed in 2024 calls for inclusive AI governance. Yet there is no binding international framework on AI's labor consequences, and core questions — retraining obligations, transparency in algorithmic management, social protection for displaced workers, taxation of automation gains, and the rights of data workers — remain contested. Delegates should consider how to align trade, education, social protection, and technology governance to ensure that productivity gains from AI are broadly shared and that workers, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, are not left bearing the adjustment costs alone.

Key players

Reaffirming International Humanitarian Law in Armed Conflict

International humanitarian law, codified principally in the four 1949 Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols, sets the rules governing the conduct of hostilities and the protection of those who do not or no longer take part in fighting — civilians, the wounded, prisoners of war, humanitarian workers, and medical personnel. The framework also encompasses customary IHL, the Rome Statute of the ICC, and specific instruments protecting cultural property and prohibiting particular weapons. The ICRC serves as guardian and promoter of these rules. Recent conflicts have placed IHL under acute strain. The wars in Ukraine, Gaza, Sudan, Myanmar, Ethiopia, and Syria have generated credible allegations of indiscriminate attacks, sieges, attacks on hospitals and humanitarian convoys, sexual violence, and forced displacement. Aid worker deaths reached record highs in 2023 and 2024, and attacks on medical facilities have become routine features of urban warfare. The ICC has issued arrest warrants involving senior Russian and Israeli officials and Hamas leaders, prompting both renewed attention to accountability and political backlash, including sanctions against ICC officials. The debate is less about the content of IHL — which remains broadly accepted — than about compliance, accountability, and political will. Delegates must consider how to strengthen investigation and prosecution of violations, protect humanitarian and medical workers, ensure humanitarian access, address the conduct of non-state armed groups, and resist arguments that security threats justify carve-outs from established protections.

Key players

Ending the Criminalization of Migrants, Refugees, and Asylum Seekers in Developed Countries

The 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, together with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the 2018 Global Compacts on Migration and on Refugees, establish that seeking asylum is a right, that refoulement is prohibited, and that irregular entry alone should not be punished. In practice, developed receiving states have increasingly turned to criminal law, mandatory detention, offshore processing, and externalization arrangements to deter irregular arrivals. The US Title 42 expulsions and subsequent asylum restrictions, the UK-Rwanda removals scheme, the EU-Türkiye and EU-Tunisia migration agreements, Australia's offshore processing in Nauru and PNG, and Italy's Albania protocol all reflect this trend. UN human rights bodies, the UNHCR, and the Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants have repeatedly criticized criminalization, prolonged detention of children, pushbacks at sea and land borders, and the framing of migration primarily as a security threat. At the same time, displacement has reached record levels — over 120 million forcibly displaced people in 2024 — driven by conflict, climate stress, and economic collapse, while political backlash against immigration has reshaped electoral politics across Europe and North America. The committee must address how to reconcile state sovereignty over borders with binding human rights and refugee law obligations, expand safe and legal pathways, end the use of criminal sanctions for irregular entry, and ensure responsibility-sharing so that frontline states in the Global South are not left to host the overwhelming majority of refugees.

Key players

Renewing International Commitments to Nuclear Non-Proliferation

The 1968 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) rests on three pillars: non-proliferation, disarmament, and the peaceful use of nuclear energy. With 191 states parties, it remains the cornerstone of the nuclear order, supported by the IAEA safeguards system and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (not yet in force). The regime has slowed proliferation — many states that could have built nuclear weapons did not — but it is under unprecedented stress. The 2022 NPT Review Conference ended without consensus, blocked by Russia over Ukraine-related language; the 2026 RevCon preparatory process has been similarly fraught. Russia suspended participation in New START in 2023 and de-ratified the CTBT; the United States has signaled potential responses if treaty constraints lapse in 2026. North Korea has continued nuclear and missile testing and codified a first-use doctrine. Iran's enrichment has advanced well beyond JCPOA limits following the 2018 US withdrawal, and the 2025 Israeli and US strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities have created new uncertainties about Tehran's program and intentions. China is undertaking the largest nuclear buildup in its history, and the 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, while in force, is rejected by all nuclear-armed states. Delegates must consider how to preserve the NPT bargain, restart arms control between Washington and Moscow, bring China into strategic stability talks, address proliferation risks in the Middle East and on the Korean Peninsula, and respond to the disarmament frustrations of non-nuclear-weapon states.

Key players

Establishing a Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone in the Middle East

Nuclear-weapon-free zones (NWFZs) covering Latin America (Tlatelolco, 1967), the South Pacific (Rarotonga, 1985), Southeast Asia (Bangkok, 1995), Africa (Pelindaba, 1996), and Central Asia (Semipalatinsk, 2006) cover most of the Southern Hemisphere and demonstrate that regional denuclearization is possible. The idea of a Middle East zone free of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction was first proposed by Iran and Egypt at the UNGA in 1974 and was a central, unfulfilled commitment of the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference. The 2010 RevCon agreed to convene a regional conference, which Israel did not attend and which did not take place as planned. Since 2019, the UN General Assembly has convened an annual Conference on the Establishment of a Middle East Zone Free of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction, producing political declarations but without Israeli or US participation. Israel maintains a policy of nuclear ambiguity and is widely assessed to possess nuclear weapons; Iran's advanced enrichment program, regional rivalries, the collapse of the JCPOA, and the 2024-2025 direct military exchanges between Iran and Israel have made the security environment deeply hostile to negotiation. Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Egypt, and Türkiye have all explored civilian nuclear programs, raising latent proliferation concerns. Delegates must address how to build confidence between regional rivals, sequence security and arms control steps, leverage IAEA safeguards and verification, learn from other zonal treaties, and consider whether progress is possible in other regions — including Northeast Asia and the Arctic — where zone proposals have circulated.

Key players

Key terms & resources

The concepts worth knowing before Opening Round Championship Series, plus lessons and profiles to go deeper.

Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention Anti-Personnel Mines anti-dumping duties Asylum Asylum and Migration Pact (EU)Asylum Cooperative Agreements

In the news

Recent reporting to ground your prep

China's New Strategy for Taiwan and Japan

Story

North Korea's Nuclear Navy Developments

Story

North Korea's Nuclear Navy Ambitions

Story

Raghav Chadha's Defection Exposes Law Flaws

Story

Frequently asked questions

Related conferences

Opening Round Championship Series

Mar 14–15, 2026Hamilton, United StatesIn-person

ConcludedRegistration closed

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 1 countries stand on the dominant committee topic. Click through for the full country profile.

United States

The USA is the host nation for this collegiate mock trial competition, providing the foundational legal framework and educational institutions that participate.

Role in topic

Topics & background

The history behind each committee topic and the states that shape it.

Reaffirming the Global Commitment to Eliminating Anti-Personnel Landmines

Key players

Prohibiting the Targeting of Civilians and Non-Combatants by Armed Drones

Key players

Reducing Global Trade Tensions and Lowering Tariff and Non-Tariff Barriers

Key players

Mitigating the Impact of Artificial Intelligence and Automation on Workers Worldwide

Key players

Reaffirming International Humanitarian Law in Armed Conflict

Key players

Ending the Criminalization of Migrants, Refugees, and Asylum Seekers in Developed Countries

Key players

Renewing International Commitments to Nuclear Non-Proliferation

Key players

Establishing a Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone in the Middle East

Key players

Key terms & resources

The concepts worth knowing before Opening Round Championship Series, plus lessons and profiles to go deeper.

Anti-Personnel Mine Ban Convention Anti-Personnel Mines anti-dumping duties Asylum Asylum and Migration Pact (EU)Asylum Cooperative Agreements

In the news

Recent reporting to ground your prep

China's New Strategy for Taiwan and Japan

Story

North Korea's Nuclear Navy Developments

Story

North Korea's Nuclear Navy Ambitions

Story

Raghav Chadha's Defection Exposes Law Flaws

Story

Country perspectives

Topics & background

Key terms & resources

Frequently asked questions

Related conferences

2025-2026 Santa Clara County Mock Trial Invitational

16th Annual University of Cincinnati High School Mock Trial Invitational

University of Denver Denver Duels Invitational 2026

Montgomery County High School Mock Trial Competition 2026

Great Chicago Fire Invitational XII

21st Annual Ramblin' Wreck Invitational Tournament

Related conferences

2025-2026 Santa Clara County Mock Trial Invitational

16th Annual University of Cincinnati High School Mock Trial Invitational

University of Denver Denver Duels Invitational 2026

Montgomery County High School Mock Trial Competition 2026

Great Chicago Fire Invitational XII

21st Annual Ramblin' Wreck Invitational Tournament

Country perspectives

Topics & background

Key terms & resources

Frequently asked questions

Related conferences

2025-2026 Santa Clara County Mock Trial Invitational

16th Annual University of Cincinnati High School Mock Trial Invitational

University of Denver Denver Duels Invitational 2026

Montgomery County High School Mock Trial Competition 2026

Great Chicago Fire Invitational XII

21st Annual Ramblin' Wreck Invitational Tournament

Related conferences

2025-2026 Santa Clara County Mock Trial Invitational

16th Annual University of Cincinnati High School Mock Trial Invitational

University of Denver Denver Duels Invitational 2026

Montgomery County High School Mock Trial Competition 2026

Great Chicago Fire Invitational XII

21st Annual Ramblin' Wreck Invitational Tournament