[caption id="attachment_36956" align="alignright" width="455"] The Dutch victory celebration featuring European champions Katharina Margareta Jansen (4th from left), Emma Lucas (5th f.l.) Louis Honee (6th f.l.) and David Metz (7th f.l.) - © Louis Honee[/caption] The Astana EUDC 2020 has come to an end and it has been a successful tournament for the Leiden Debating Union. The Dutch debating society was able to win both the ESL and Open final and topped the ESL speaker awards as well. In the grand final, Leiden A (David Metz, Emma Lucas) took the victory out of Closing Opposition against the Opening Government Leiden C (Louis Honee, ...

The team TCD Hist (Caoimhin Hamill, Jack Synnott) has emerged victorious in the Grand Final of the KCL Online Open 2020, speaking from OG on the motion "THP to be alone in the universe." Against them were левый коронный (Milla Huuskonen, Muhktar Tashkenbayev) in Opening Opposition, LSE A (Ciara Mitchell, Hamza Tariq Chaudhry) in Closing Government, and Persistent Pufferfish (Naomi Panovka, Xiao-Ke Lu) in Closing Opposition. The adjudication panel consisted of Neo Way Shen (chair), Dani Georgiev, Ife Grillo, Jacklin Kwan and Marta Vasić. The ESL Final was won by Amsterdam A (Marike Breed, Nikola Michaylov) in Opening Opposition on the motion ...

[caption id="attachment_35249" align="alignright" width="400"] The Belgrade delegation and their teampartners including the open final winners Floris Holstege (l.) and Janko Djordjevic (2nd f. r.) as well as best speakers Miloš Marjanovic and Tin Puljić (3rd/4rd f. l.) - (c) Otvorena komunikacija[/caption] The Budapest Open 2019 saw the teams in Closing Government sweeping both final rounds, with De grootse Nederlands-Servische alliantie (Janko Djordjevic, Floris Holstege;Belgrade/Leiden) winning the crown on the motion "This house regrets the narrative that forgiveness is a virtue". Against them were Autinzam i renesansa (Tin Puljić, Ilija Ivanišević; Zagreb/Belgrade) in Opening Government, Velika Srpsko-Holandska Alijansa (Miloš Marjanovic, David Metz; Belgrade/Leiden) in ...

The weekend of May 26th and 27th featured this year's Vienna IV, chief-adjudicated by Alex Moise and Monica Forman and, as every year, complemented by a Schnitzel night and a post-final karaoke. In the final, judged by Elaye Karstadt (chair), Monica Forman, Alex Moise, Huyen Nguyen and Katrin Fallmann, BGU A (OO, Ayal Hayut-Man and Noa Ovadia) prevailed over The von Shap Family (OG, Yonathan Shapira and Michael Shapira), Belgrade DCA (CG, Ilija Ivanišević and Miloš Marjanović) and Jenseits von Vergleich und Analyse (CO, Philipp Müller and Calyxx Peucker) on the motion "This House believes that consent isn't the solitary ...

[caption id="attachment_32040" align="alignright" width="158"] Winners of the Helsinki Open - Alex Harris (left) and Brian Wong (right) - © Brian Wong[/caption] Congratulations to ‘Alex is never Wong’ (Alex Harris, former ULU, and Brian Wong, Oxford) for winning the Helsinki Open 2017. They won the final from Closing Government defeating ‘The Cupcakes or Your Life’ (Miri Muntean and Ingo Bandhauer, Vienna) in Opening Government, ‘Schrodinger’s Dichotomy’ (Jenni Juvonven, former Tampere, and Martijn Roo, Berlin) in Opening Opposition, and ‘Mainor A’ (Oskar Gross and Kasper) in Closing Opposition on the motion ‘This House would grant an amnesty to citizens who fought for ISIS ...

The team Bailey orders asian Teck-a-Wei (Teck Wei Tan & Bailey Reid, Oxford/KC London) won the final of Centrale Open 2016 from Opening Opposition. They won over Tilbury House Minions (Agnes Putri & Leonard Münstermann, Cologne) in Opening Government, There is but one God and He is not called Jesus (Dan Lahav & Muhammad Asadullah Khan, Tel Aviv/Cambridge) in Closing Government and Cardiff A (Raphael Hill & Calan Eskandar) in Closing Opposition on the motion "THBT the Democratic Party should take on a much more centre-leftist position and support a mass redistribution of wealth agenda". The final was judged by Harish Natarajan in chair, together with Sharmila Parmanand, Nika ...

„We are here because we didn't have a cancellation agreement“ (Jeroen Wijnen and Roel Becker, Leiden) won the final of the Lund IV in Opening Opposition. Debating the motion "THB that nuclear weapons have made the world a safer place.", they defeated "Belgrade A" (Ilija Ivanišević and Đorđe Jovićević) in Opening Government, "UCD Law A" (Adam Stairs and Aodhan Peelo) in Closing Government and "Cambridge CK" (George Clay and Muhammad Asadullah Khan) in Closing Opposition. The full debate is available on Youtube. Best speaker was Aodhan Peelo (UCD Law A) with an average of 82.6 points. [caption id="attachment_30505" align="alignright" width="400"] From left ...

[caption id="attachment_29710" align="alignright" width="344"] View over Warsaw - © Lennart Lokstein[/caption] The European Universities Debating Championship is over. Winner of the ESL-final is Tel Aviv A (Dan Lahav, Ayal Hayut-man) from Closing Government, thus becoming ESL-Champions, whereas the teams Tel Aviv C (Tom Manor, Noam Dahan) from Opening Government, Leiden D (Lisa Schallenberg, Simon Martina-Perez) from Opening Opposition and Leiden A (Floris Holstege, Emma Lucas) from Closing Opposition become vice ESL-Champions. The final's motion was "This house believes that western states should support breakaway regions in former Sovjet states (e.g. East Ukraine l South Ossetia) joining the Russian federation conditional on holding free and ...