By Manuela Caccialanza and Alessandro Villani, Linklaters LLP Another chapter of the never-ending West Tankers saga has recently concluded, seemingly scoring a success as to protection of a party’s right to arbitrate. On 4 April 2012 the High Court of Justice determined the appeal brought by West Tankers against the arbitration award that had denied…
In Honeywell v Meydan Group LLC ([2014] EWHC 1344 (TCC)) the High Court in London upheld a DIAC award against the owner of the Meydan Racecourse in Dubai, rejecting allegations that the underlying contract was procured through bribery. The decision is just one of a number of claims arising out of the construction of the…
By Philipp Groz and James Menz, Schellenberg Wittmer In March 2014, the Geneva-based World Intellectual Property Organization’s (WIPO) Arbitration and Mediation Center (the “Center”) presented the revised WIPO Arbitration Rules (“WIPO Rules”) and WIPO Expedited Arbitration Rules. The revised rules will enter into force on 1 June 2014 and apply to all WIPO arbitrations commenced…
The views expressed are those of the author alone and should not be regarded as representative of or binding upon the author’s institution or the ArbitralWomen. Adam Raviv recently posted an entry about the Eleventh Annual ITA-ASIL Conference on class and mass claims in arbitration. Adam’s summary provides excellent insights into the importance of large-scale…
By Sapna Jhangiani and Khaled Moyeed, Clyde & Co LLP “To the question: What are the professional rules applicable to an Indian lawyer in a Hong Kong arbitration between a Bahraini claimant and a Japanese defendant represented by New York lawyers, the answer is no more obvious than it would be in London, Paris, Geneva…
For more information about ITAFOR, click here. To subscribe to ITAFOR, click here. The Institute for Transnational Arbitration (ITA), the Asociación Latinoamericana de Arbitraje (ALARB) and the Comitê Brasileiro de Arbitragem (CBAr), are pleased to announce the launch of a new online forum for the discussion of pertinent legal issues relating to arbitration of Latin…
Over the years Latin American countries have played an increasingly relevant role in the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (the “ICSID”), with the highest proportion – 27% – of all cases handled by the Centre. Despite the high percentage these same countries have been increasingly expressing their dislike about having to resolve their…
By Michael Polkinghorne & Charles B. Rosenberg, White & Case LLP The role of the tribunal secretary in international arbitration has been called an “enormously grey area” that has been subject to instances of “abuse.” With concerns of the secretary going beyond his or her position as an assistant to the tribunal and becoming a…
and Felipe González Arrieta The UNCITRAL Rules on Transparency in Treaty-based Investor-State Arbitration (hereinafter “the Rules”) came into force in April 1, 2014. The Rules were adopted at the forty-sixth session of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law, held on July 2013, and are the result of a 3-year period effort by the…
Sandra De Vito Bieri with Anton Vucurovic 1)Sandra De Vito Bieri, attorney at law, LL.M., is a Partner and Co-Head of the Arbitration Practice Group of Bratschi Wiederkehr & Buob in Zurich and Member of the Arbitration Court of the Swiss Chambers’ Arbitration Institution; Anton Vucurovic, attorney at law, LL.M., is a Partner and Head…
Brazil has well-developed systems both in arbitration and class actions and yet the use of arbitration as a class-litigation dispute resolution has been little discussed. In the USA, on the other hand, discussions on the matter abound (see especially Supreme Court Bazzle v. Green Tree, Stolt-Nielsen S.A v. Animalfeeds International Corp. and AT&T Mobility LLC…
On February 27, 2014, Repsol S.A., Repsol Capital S.L. and Repsol Butano S.A. (collectively, ‘Repsol’), entered into a settlement agreement with Argentina, whereby Argentina agreed to pay Repsol $5 billion in USD denominated bonds as compensation for the expropriation of Repsol’s fifty-one percent shareholding in YPF S.A. and YPF Gas (the ‘Settlement Agreement’). Under the…
Critical negotiation moments punctuate the entire timeline of an international arbitration, from before it starts to even after it is over. And when these moments arise, a practitioner’s ability to negotiate effectively can sometimes be as important as their mastery of the subject matter. After all, what use is technical skill if you cannot deploy…
2013 saw the establishment of Serbia’s first arbitration institution which is not affiliated to the State – Belgrade Arbitration Center (BAC), created under the auspices of the Serbian Arbitration Association, a non-governmental and non-profit association of legal professionals and other individuals interested in arbitration law and promotion of arbitration. BAC is the third arbitral institution…
The very nature of international arbitration entails parties, arbitrators and any other participant in the arbitral proceedings generally being of different nationalities and speaking different languages. Therefore, the language in which the proceedings will be held becomes of great importance for the characteristic purpose of arbitration itself: the consensual resolution of disputes. Nevertheless, the procedural…
Exorbitant jurisdiction is generally described as comprising domestic courts’ powers in cross-border litigation to assume jurisdiction based on a very thin (although in the courts’ view sufficient and permitted by the courts’ domestic law) link between the case and the forum State. This may be based on territoriality (e.g. the respondent having assets in the…
This post is just a quick reminder about the European Parliament survey of arbitration practitioners that is currently undertaken by a team at the Brunel Center for the Study of Arbitration and Cross-Border Investment, led by Tony Cole. The survey is available at this link. The study concerns both the legal instruments developed in relation…
By Justin D’Agostino, Jessica Booth and Tracy Wu, Herbert Smith Freehills Ever since the internal fight between CIETAC (Beijing) and its Shanghai and Shenzhen sub-commissions became public in May 2012, the internal jurisdictional dispute between Beijing and the two sub-commissions has loomed large, resulting in the latter two declaring independence, re-naming themselves and introducing new…
Stare decisis is Latin for “to stand by things decided”. This is also a doctrine which is frequently used by courts which decides to abide by a point of law which was previously held by a court of equal or superior judicial hierarchy. The system of stare decisis purports to promote stability, certainty, reliability, uniformity,…
During past months, the Belgian arbitration community has been very active in promoting its country and Brussels in particular, as a major international arbitration centre. 2013 and 2014 are indeed vintage years for Belgian arbitration. First, the Cepani, the major Belgian arbitration institution, modernised its arbitration rules. The new rules entered into force as from…
Former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld famously introduced into the American lexicon the oxymoronic concept of the “known unknown”—“that is to say we know there are some things we do not know.”1)See Michiko Kakutani, Rumsfeld’s Defense of Known Decisions, N.Y. TIMES (Feb. 3, 2011), https://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/04/books/04book.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1& (reviewing DONALD RUMSFELD, KNOWN AND UNKNOWN: A MEMIOR (2011)). A…
In an encouraging ruling of earlier this year (see Case No. 249 of 2013 – Middle East Foundations LLC v. Meydan Group LLC (formerly Meydan LLC), Commercial Appeal, ruling of the Dubai Court of Appeal of 15 January 2014), the Dubai Court of Appeal confirmed the time extension provisions for rendering final awards under the…
On 16 April 2014, the Parliament of the European Union has published legislative resolution No P7_TA-PROV (2014) 0419 on the proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council establishing framework for managing financial responsibility linked to investor-state dispute settlement tribunals established by international agreements to which the European Union is a…
By Karl Pörnbacher and Lars Pütz, Hogan Lovells LLP An arbitral tribunal’s preliminary ruling on its jurisdiction can be challenged by application for state court decision according to Sec. 1040 (3) German Code of Civil Procedure, following the example of Art. 16 of the UNCITRAL Model Law. Such a case has been decided by the…
