Malaysia's Dewan Rakyat has passed the International Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation Act, the domestic legislation required before the country can ratify the Singapore Convention it signed back in 2019.
Once ratification follows, businesses mediating cross-border disputes will be able to enforce their settlement agreements directly in Malaysian courts — no more converting them into judgments or arbitral awards first. For a trading nation at the heart of ASEAN, that removes real friction from choosing mediation.
The timing compounds the momentum: the Asian International Arbitration Centre in Kuala Lumpur has just issued Mediation Rules 2026 allowing mediation to run concurrently alongside arbitration. Piece by piece, Malaysia is assembling one of the region's most mediation-friendly legal environments — a win worth celebrating in APMC's home country.
