The Advisory Panel is a committee that consists of individual parties called “experts,” selected by their state to share their expertise and extensive amounts of topic-specific knowledge on finding plausible solutions to contemporary issues. The agenda items that the experts will discuss are selected from troublesome issues of a specific sub-region of the world that are linked to the conference’s theme. The committee follows the ad-hoc structure of debate where individual clauses are discussed separately from one another. Unlike other committees that also follow this format, the Panel requires unanimous approval of the clause by all experts, in which case a simple valid objection raised by a single expert obstructs said approval. In the event of a clause failing to get unanimous approval, the clause is considered to be “tabled.” The tabled clauses are later on debated after their respective rounds of lobbying, and until the clause passes, the structure repeats itself a total of 3 times with a clause failing to pass in all rounds of debate being considered “failed.”

After all three rounds of debate for each agenda item are finished, the passing clauses are then united under a resolution referred to as the “joint communique.” The joint communique is lastly debated upon by experts to be later presented to the United Nations Secretary-General at the end of the conference. Given its nature of sponsoring amplified levels of quality debate, the committee is suitable for students who share a higher quantity of MUN experience.

In this year’s Koç JMUN, the Panel will focus on the Eastern Mediterranean region. The Eastern Mediterranean is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Being the very region where the oldest and perhaps most impactful civilizations once resided, it continues its role as a fundamental region when it comes to global politics and economics. This can be attributed to the fact that it is crucial in providing trade opportunities to nations wishing to trade with their intercontinental partners through routes like the Suez Canal, the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles Strait, the Anatolian Peninsula, or the islands like Crete or Cyprus that offer checkpoints for maritime trade. Although the region is rich in terms of possibilities for growth and development, whether it be rich in natural resources like natural gas or oil, or the abundance of trade as mentioned, the region still is obstructed in its pathway to peace and solidarity due to ongoing political disputes, conflicts, and tensions. There have been major conflicts and disputes over territories like Cyprus or the Aegean Islands that have only soured the already distant relations between neighboring states like Türkiye and Greece. It is also vital to recognise how many international powers like the United States of America, the Russian Federation, France, and the United Kingdom are already closely involved in the region through overseas military bases that are already a topic of discussion in stabilizing relations between states.

Referring back to our theme of “Adopting global diplomacy as a catalyst for combatting international conflicts,” it should be noted for experts that the complexity of the topics assigned makes diplomacy perhaps the most viable solution. In the end, experts in the Koç JMUN Advisory Panel will cooperate, discuss, brainstorm, and debate on the most urgent topics of this year’s sub-region.