Paul Reichler, a Washington-based lawyer, has spent much of his career representing small countries against big ones: Nicaragua versus the U.S.; Georgia versus Russia; Mauritius versus the U.K., Bangladesh versus India.

His first big victory made headlines in the 1980s when the International Court of Justice in The Hague ruled that U.S. support for Contra rebels trying to overthrow the left-wing Sandinista government of Nicaragua violated international law.

That is one reason to pay attention to the case he launched this year at a United Nations arbitration body: the Philippines versus China.

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