In this interview, Adithi and Charu speak with Pratyusha Ivaturi, a consultant with the Codification Division of the UN Office of Legal Affairs, and Kwon Yongmi, a Counter-Trafficking Associate with IOM Nigeria, about their very different paths into international law – from mooting and academic research to internships across the UN system, the role of a master’s degree, the costs of an itinerant early career, and what continues to give them hope for the discipline at a moment many call a crisis for international law. One can apply for roles at the United Nations (jobs and internships) through UN Inspira after making an account on the website. Alternatively, one can also apply for roles through UN Volunteers (UNV). For more information on career routes into the UN, you may click here.

Adithi: Let’s start by talking about what drew you to international law. When did you decide that this was the career path you wanted?

Yongmi: I decided on this field pretty late. I hadn’t expected to end up in law, but I’d always been drawn to how society works – its systems, its safety nets. When I chose to study law, I’d imagined law as an anchor for a ship – something that keeps you stable through a storm – and wanted to help build the foundations of that stability. But much of what I found myself studying was a different set of questions: the ship is broken; what went wrong, who is liable, and how should it be repaired? This was meaningful, but I couldn’t quite picture myself practising law in the conventional sense. Then I took an international law class, and it felt like what I’d originally imagined law to be. What drew me in was that it’s fundamentally political and diplomatic – a constant process of discussion and negotiation, where what states say, and deliberately don’t say, actually shapes things. Around then, I met a professor who introduced me to human rights advocacy, including through UN Human Rights Committee state reviews. For the first time, I could see myself actually doing this – contributing through international law and the UN system. It also confirmed what I’d started to suspect: for me, a job can’t just be a job – I need real convictionthat what I do matters, to me and to the world.

Adithi: If I can push on that a little more – what was your path like after deciding you wanted to do international law? 

Yongmi: This is a fairly uncommon path for a law student in Korea, especially without an international law master’s. But I always knew what I wanted. So right after I graduated, I started with an internship at UNCITRAL Regional Centre for Asia and the Pacific (UNCITRAL-RCAP) in Korea, which gave me a real sense of how the UN supports member states – not just by developing international standards, but by helping align national legal frameworks with them. After that, since I’d always been interested in treaty law, I applied to the Treaty Section of the Office of Legal Affairs at UN Headquarters. That was a different dimension – I really got to see how diplomacy, multilateral dialogue, and law intersect. Throughout law school and after, I also kept doing human rights advocacy – looking at whether countries were actually following international law and reflecting it in their own legislation and policies. I really enjoyed looking into how international law is developed, how it works in practice, and how it translates into domestic contexts, but I felt it was time to dive into how that plays out on the ground at the country level. That’s why I came to my current role at IOM Nigeria – still within the UN system, but at a very different stage of the process.

Pratyusha: My interest in international law started in a fairly traditional Indian law-student way – through mooting. I did the Manfred Lachs Moot, a space law moot. It didn’t lead anywhere in particular, but what drew me to the subject was the creative openness it offered – so much imagination involved, hypothesising about what governance of this global commons could even look like.Mooting became an extracurricular activity I stayed involved in, and I also explored different areas of international law through it. Before law school, I’d wanted to study literature, but that didn’t happen because a professional course felt more practical at the time – international law became the subject I could genuinely pursue that interest through. So I specialised early: even while doing the usual litigation and corporate internships, it all became a way to keep working toward international law.At GNLU, we had some opportunities to work with ILC members, and when I entered my fourth year, Dr. Patel had just joined the International Law Commission and was recruiting research assistants. GNLU had a foreign internship scholarship, so I went to Geneva and experienced the ILC early in my journey. It was a great opportunity, and I met brilliant people there – those pursuing their PhDs and those already working in the field. That reinforced that this discipline is also a lot about community.By my fifth year, I had a corporate law firm offer in hand, and I’d also applied for a master’s. Doing a master’s felt like the natural next step, since most opportunities in international law – paid or unpaid – require at least an LLM. So I applied, got into Cambridge, and went straight after my undergrad.The advice I kept getting on navigating the job market after my master’s was that it’s a numbers game – you just need that one opportunity to work out. Mine ended up being an internship with the Codification Division in the Office of Legal Affairs in New York. These internships are unpaid, and New York is an extremely expensive city; some universities do offer funding, but I hadn’t planned far enough ahead to secure it. Considering the opportunity, I made the move anyway, from October 2025 to early this year.Towards the end of my internship, my division was looking for consultants to work on the Repertory of Practice of United Nations Organs. Given the timing, the demand, and a lot of luck, I was offered the option to stay on as a consultant – the role I’m in now. 

Charu: How would you say your university and internship experiences shaped how you reached your current positions, and how do they impact the way you perceive the work you do now?

Yongmi: I was fortunate to work as a research assistant for one of my professors during law school, engaging in applied – rather than purely academic – research on international human rights. In both my internships, I further learned to approach legal research in its broader institutional and societal context, while considering its practical relevance for the UN and its member states. Now, as a Counter-Trafficking Associate, research and evidence generation remain a significant part of the work I support, informing programming and policy development.Another big part of how I came to this role was coordination – something not always seen as central to legal practice, but often an important dimension of UN work. My experiences in human rights advocacy, at UNCITRAL-RCAP, and in the Treaty Section exposed me to engagement and coordination with different actors in different institutional contexts, and this gave me a strong foundation for the multi-stakeholder dialogue I now undertake with government, civil society, academia, and other partners.

Pratyusha: For me, it started with mooting, and each opportunity opened up the next. What’s remained consistent is a growing understanding of what international legal research demands: how you approach it, what comprehensive, sensitive research looks like – taking account of, say, Third World Approaches to International Law – and how that carries into more doctrinal settings. One thing that’s really equipped me for my current consultancy is understanding what writing for an international organisation looks like – which can be very different from academic writing. Here, writing involves additional considerations, such as drafting a balanced text and approaching the law in a fairly matter-of-fact way.During my master’s, I took courses that gave me a real diversity of research approaches – one on the history and theory of international law, which focused on methodology, and others, like global governance, that examined various international organisations and legal frameworks. Having done the master’s deepened my interest by the time I got the Codification internship, giving me a much wider lens on the division’s work.I’ve always said the internship came at the right time for me – I don’t think I’d have gotten as much out of it earlier, since as an intern, most of your learning is observational. As Yongmi said, a lot of it is tasks you wouldn’t necessarily call ‘legal’ – sitting in and taking notes for a meeting, for instance. You find value in having access to those spaces, more than in the tasks themselves.

Adithi: If we can talk about your masters some more— Yongmi, you chose not to do an LLM, Pratyusha you mentioned seeing an LLM as a natural stepping stone into an international law career. A lot of our peers in India, when weighing whether to take on this investment, wonder whether it is a precondition for landing a job similar to yours. Do you have any advice on how important a master’s degree really is, and whether there are paths into the UN without one? 

Charu: And if I can add to that, would you say there’s a cultural dimension here – does this work differently in Korea versus India?

Pratyusha: With respect to India, I came in believing a master’s would be essential, partly because I was around people who’d entered the field after doing one. I got a scholarship before my master’s, which was a big factor for me, since the master’s meant turning down a job at a law firm. But once in the field, I realised it’s more a preference than a strict requirement. However, because in India we go straight from high school into law school, unlike many other countries where you’d have completed another degree first, it doesn’t always show much maturity to apply right out of undergrad. A master’s signals specific interest and awareness of the work you’re taking on.That said, my work with Dr Patel at the ILC happened during my undergraduate degree, and that’s what opened up international law for me later. So I’d say a postgraduate degree is good to have, but you can navigate without one – though a lot of how you navigate the field also comes from watching people who’ve ‘made it,’ and that peer group for me mostly did a master’s before. Some work experience before helps too. Everyone has their own path in that regard. 

Yongmi: Korea has a different context, because our law school is a graduate programme, like in the US. Even so, ininternational law, an LLM or master’s is often seen as a strong indication of commitment to the field. That’s why I wasn’t entirely sure I’d be able to enter the field without one.I only have an academic background in general law, but what mattered more, at least in my case, was showing genuine engagement with the field and an understanding of the day-to-day work behind it. When I applied for the internship with the Treaty Section, I was fortunate that my interests and previous experiences aligned closely with the Section’s work, and much of what I spoke about in the interview later turned out to be directly relevant to the work I did there.So I’m living proof that a master’s isn’t a strict requirement. But I should also say that all my co-interns had master’s degrees, mostly from the US or Europe – I was the only one who’d studied only in Korea. That’s part of why I still feel a bit like an impostor, but if you genuinely love international law, I think that goes a long way.

Charu: For anyone hoping to be in your position in two or three years, what would be a piece of advice you’d give them? And what would you do differently if you were applying for this position all over again?

Pratyusha: This is a hard one, but I do have a partial answer, and it comes back to resource sensitivity – that the barriers to entering this field early on are often financial. Internships at these organisations are usually in very expensive cities, and you need financial backing to do them. So I’d say: be more deliberate about locating funding and apply on time. Cambridge, for instance, had a summer scholarship I could have applied for in March, and I simply missed it. I’d also say: take some of the sting out of not being selected. Having been an intern myself, I understood that there are many factors beyond your control; for instance, regional representation matters even when hiring interns. If an organisation took on someone of your nationality or region last cohort, they might choose someone else next time, even if you’re equally qualified. If I were doing it again, I’d be more deliberate about locating these opportunities and resources – I had friends with state or university sponsorships for unpaid internships like mine, and wish I’d looked into that more.

Yongmi: I completely agree – I got a scholarship to go to New York myself, and it helped me not feel a constant guilt about finances. That’s the reality for a lot of us: we’re there to gain experience, which is incredibly valuable, but it can come with real financial pressure. Having that kind of support really helps.And about my position: my current role is quite different from what people think of as ‘international law’ work. I’m using my background in international law, which helps me understand systems and how international commitments translate into national realities, but the work itself isn’t necessarily international law. So the first thing I’d say is: be sure of what you actually want. I knew I wanted to try a different side of things, and was open to non-legal work too. Another thing is location. You need to know whether you’re genuinely comfortable with where you’ll be living and working. But at the same time, I hope people don’t pre-emptively rule out countries that feel unfamiliar or aren’t ‘typical’ international law destinations. Nigeria wasn’t somewhere I’d ever imagined myself, even a few months ago, but it’s opened up more experiences for me than I even knew existed.

Adithi: Thank you for talking about location and your experiences with moving, Yongmi – I think we don’t talk enough about how much international law careers affect people personally. My next question is about that: your journeys through so many internships and opportunities have taken you both across the world. I am sure this must come with the personal challenge of constantly uprooting and rerouting your life in unfamiliar spaces. Was this something you always knew you were signing up for? And more broadly – how do you navigate the uncertainty of this discipline in general: you don’t know where you’ll be in a month, whether you’ll have a job in two months, what your funding will look like. How do you navigate that?

Pratyusha: I genuinely love moving around – even now, I am applying for opportunities, regardless of location. Some of that comes from holding an Indian passport and understanding how much these opportunities open up. Living somewhere also offers so much more than just visiting, despite all the initial anxiety. Everyone around you is going through the same thing – you meet incredible people, become close friends quickly, and then six months later you leave and might never see them again – a strange but wonderful kind of community.(laughs) What I don’t like is the uncertainty about what comes next. But that’s a decision I made with my eyes open. I consulted a lot of people before committing to my master’s, and got more ‘don’t do it’ than ‘do it’. There’s no real structure; you’re moving from contract to contract, especially now, when things feel particularly uncertain. I went in ‘delusionally’ optimistic, aware of the cost, and always tried to stay prepared for periods without work in international law.What keeps me in it is that there’s so much about this discipline that exists outside traditional employment. International law feels fairly non-hierarchical – whether you’re working at an organisation or writing about it as a student, you hold some equal claim to shaping what the discipline is. I’ve seen so many brilliant early-career people write incredible things and hold deep expertise, and that felt like a good enough reason to keep going. A lot of that has to do with the people, and the unstructured nature of the field – which gives you a lot of room to call your own shots.

Yongmi: And it’s great to have such brilliant people navigating the same uncertainty alongside you. It means you canlaugh about it together, and there’s a real sense of solidarity in that.As for moving around, it’s never been a major priority for me – where I end up matters much less to me than the work itself. The uncertainty, though, is very real, and you feel it more sharply once you’re inside an organisation, because you get a clearer sense of what’s going on. I’d genuinely recommend people consider that seriously before jumping in.For me personally, I had a long stretch – especially during law school – to think through what I want from life, who I am, and what I value. Those weren’t easy questions, but going through that process gave me the conviction that this was what I wanted, no matter what, which is why I don’t feel as anxious about the uncertainty as I probably should. I think a lot of people in this field are like that – we’re kind of hopeless optimists, and honestly, I think you need to be, for international law to really resonate with you.

Charu: That hope really connects to our last question. Both of you got into international law seeing it as a field full of possibility – for meaning, for imagination, for creativity. Yet everyone seems to describe this as a period of crisis for the discipline itself. How do you hold onto that hope – not just in yourselves and your community, but in international law as a field – at a time like this?

Yongmi: It’s certainly a period of crisis – there’s a lot of scepticism, and it’s sometimes frustrating to watch parts of the discipline seem to unravel. But a breach of the law doesn’t mean the law itself is meaningless. I actually think this crisis has produced more discussion of international law than before – even from outside the international law community.What drew me to international law in the first place is that it isn’t a static framework – it’s a constant discussion. Even when that discussion feels politically fluid, its accumulation can eventually harden into something more solid: standards, rules.For some, that won’t feel solid enough; they want a visible result. But international law is interesting precisely because its progress isn’t always visible. Agreement is important, but disagreement, or even deliberate silence, doesn’t necessarily indicate failure. There’s still hope, and I think a moment like this makes international law more important, not less – I genuinely believe the discussion is heading somewhere better.

Pratyusha: I hold onto hope for two reasons. First, the people – some of the most imaginative, creative, fulfilling people I’ve met have been in this field, shaping me beyond mere academic interests. I’ve grown personally because of the places and communities this discipline has connected me with.Second, the hope I see comes mostly from people who’ve seemingly been failed by international law and yet consistently turn to it in times of crisis. I’ve seen people directly affected by crises hold onto the language, the framework – admittedly utopian – and the ideal of international law and its protections. That gives me hope: it suggests the discipline still has legitimacy and still sustains people through crisis. The language of international law is invoked more by those affected by it than by traditional actors, and that makes me feel a responsibility to keep working in that direction.It’s quite interesting that the UN Charter opens with “We the Peoples” and is then read as a treaty limited to states. That phrase reaches a more collective sense of an international community beyond institutions. The more we cede that idealistic language to limiting narratives, the more we lose the power of centring the people in it.

Yongmi: I want to add one more note. Being inside actually gives you hope too. Partly, as Pratyusha said, it’s the people.And partly, it’s what I saw at the Treaty Section: our work isn’t always visible, yet even in difficult times, we saw more member states signing and ratifying treaties, not fewer. The commitment is still there.

Charu: This has been such a lovely discussion – we don’t often get this kind of conversation at university, about hope and navigating this profession, from people already in it. Thank you both so much for your time and honesty.

Adithi: Thank you both for being so warm and generous with your time and insight! It truly means a lot, and I’m sure a lot of our readers will benefit from hearing it.

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PC: Painting by Joe Feher