Mr Gerard Sanders was most recently Senior Adviser to the President and General Counsel Emeritus of the Asian Infrastructure  Investment Bank, an international financial institution headquartered in Beijing. He retired from that role after forty years as a lawyer, including thirty working for multilateral financial institutions. He earlier served as General Counsel and member of the Executive Committee of the AIIB, advising the governance bodies and establishing and leading the legal function. Immediately prior to his retirement from AIIB, he was Senior Adviser to the President.

Before joining AIIB, Mr. Sanders was General Counsel and member of the Executive Management Committee of the International Fund for Agricultural Development, a specialized agency of the United Nations, working at its headquarters in Rome. Previously he worked at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, at its principal office in London, most recently as Managing Director and Deputy General Counsel. At EBRD he advised on governance, loans and equity investments, dispute resolution, and legal reform.

Mr. Sanders began his career in the private sector, working on commercial law matters and public law litigation, at the law firms of Simpson Grierson (Wellington), Arnold & Porter (Washington) and Houthoff (Amsterdam). He worked as legal adviser at the headquarters of BP p.l.c. (London), advising the group’s chief financial officer and company secretary.

Mr. Sanders graduated with degrees in law and commerce from the University of Otago, New Zealand, and has post-graduate law degrees from Victoria University of Wellington and Harvard Law School. He is qualified to practice law in New Zealand, the State of Victoria, Australia, as well as England and Wales. Mr. Sanders is a mediator accredited by the Centre for Effective Dispute Resolution and is a Chartered Accountant (Australia and New Zealand). Professional affiliations include being a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators and a Chartered Fellow of the Chartered Institute for Securities and Investment.

Mr. Sanders is a member of the Law Society of England and Wales and a member of Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand.

Mr. Sanders is Honorary Senior Fellow of the British Institute of International and Comparative Law. He is Honorary Professor at Queen Mary University of London and Adjunct Professor at China University of Political Science and Law. He is a member of the Advisory Board of the Centre for Applied Sustainable Transition Law. Previously Mr. Sanders was Adjunct Professor at Peking University and Visiting Professor at Tokyo University. He has been an External Examiner, Board of Examiners, University of London, and a member of the Publications Committee of the International Bar Association. Mr. Sanders is Founding Editor of Law in Transition, Inaugural General Editor of the AIIB Yearbook of International Law, and a member of the advisory board of the Manchester Journal of International Economic Law. He has written about and taught the law of multilateral financial institutions, law and development, and legal reform in developing and transition countries. His recent article, ‘The Rule of Law on the Silk Road: History, Culture, Perspectives’, was published by the Harvard International Law Journal.