The Approach of Singapore Convention 2019 and Iranian Legal System toward Challenges of International Commercial Mediation

Mediation as one of the ways of resolving domestic and international disputes, has not been exploited as often as other dispute resolution methods. The most important cause for non-admission of mediation is the lack of enforceability of Settlement Agreements. The United Nations has resolved the deficiencie by ratifying the Singapore Convention 2019 on Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation. Iranchr('39')s adhesion to the Convention is a positive step towards enhancing the status of mediation in Iranian law. In this article, the main challenges and issues addressed in the Singapore Convention are discussed. This article concludes that some of the decisions of the Convention can be criticized, including the lack of rules on the recognition of the partieschr('39') agreement to mediate and confidentiality in the process of mediation. Due to supremacy of the mediation to other dispute resolution methods according to religious jurisprudence and Iranian legal doctrine, it is also appropriate that Iranian legal system would provide similar or even greater support for domestic Settlement Agreements than international ones.