Year: 2017

Enforcement, Hong Kong, New York Convention, Singapore, Singapore Court of Appeal, UNCITRAL Model Law

(Breakpoint LLC)/ /Leave a comment

Introduction The dispute over the enforcement of an arbitration award (“Award”) between the Astro and Lippo groups of companies has been fought out in numerous jurisdictions, notably Singapore and Hong Kong. When Astro sought to enforce the Award it had obtained against Lippo in Singapore, Lippo resisted on the ground that the tribunal (“Tribunal”) lacked…

Kluwer Mediation Blog, Mediation

(Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary University of London)/ /Leave a comment

From making the case for understanding the mediator as co-creator, with the parties, of outcomes to exploring the argument that mediators need to be qualified lawyers, there has been much lively discussion on the blog this month. You will also find a post on the key findings of recent empirical research in New Zealand on…

Arbitration, Arbitrator Intelligence, Surveys

(Bocconi University)/ /Leave a comment
Arbitrator Intelligence

After several years in the planning, one year in the making, and many months in the testing, Arbitrator Intelligence (AI) will on 1 June 2017 launch its AI Questionnaire or “AIQ.” The formal unveiling will occur in Singapore at an event hosted by the Drew & Napier law firm, supported by the Singapore International Arbitration…

CJEU, European Commission, European Union, Free Trade Agreements, TFEU

(NL-Investmentconsulting)/ /Leave a comment

On his last day in office, former EU Trade Commissioner De Gucht sent the request for an opinion from the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) aiming to get a seal of approval from the CJEU that the EU-SING FTA and all future EU trade and investment treaties fall completely within the EU’s exclusive…

Arbitrator's mandate, arbitrators’ conduct, Deliberations, Ethics, Liability, Set aside an arbitral award

(Rodrigo Elías & Medrano) and (Bullard Falla Ezcurra +)/ /4 Comments

Back in 2010, an arbitral tribunal composed by Luis Ramallo García (chairman), Miguel Temboury and Santiago Gastón ordered Puma to pay € 98 million to Estudio 2000 for the wrongful termination of their distribution contract. Notably, Mr. Gastón – appointed by Puma – did not sign the award. It was later revealed that he was…

DIFC

(Blanke Arbitration LLC)/ /Leave a comment

In a blog earlier this year, I reported in some detail on the Dubai-DIFC Judicial Committee’s first decision in Daman v. Oger (see Cassation No. 1/2016 (JT) – Daman Real Capital Partners Company LLC v. Oger Dubai LLC, hearing of 19 December 2016, published by the JT in both English and Arabic). By way of…

BIT, Denunciation, Ecuador, ISDS, Termination

(Pérez Bustamante & Ponce and Universidad San Francisco de Quito) and (Pérez Bustamante & Ponce)/ /Leave a comment

As in García-Marquez’s novel, the denunciation of the Ecuadorian bilateral investment treaties (“BITs”) represents a chronicle of a death foretold and the Ecuadorian National Assembly and Ecuador’s President have taken one of the final steps to terminate them. Along the way, the internal termination proceedings have been highly politicized, international investment arbitration has been demonized,…

Investment Arbitration, ISDS, Judicial Economy, Minimum Standard of Treatment, NAFTA, WTO

(US Department of State)/ /1 Comment

The recent mention of “judicial economy” in the award in Eli Lilly and Company v. Government of Canada provides an opportunity to consider judicial economy in investor-state arbitration more generally. In its award of March 16, 2017, the Eli Lilly tribunal determined that certain judicial interpretations of Canada’s patent law did not violate the substantive…

Applicable Law

, (Bříza & Trubač)/ /2 Comments
YIAG

International arbitration takes a great pride in being flexible, adjustable and thus very responsive to the needs of the parties involved. Indeed, in terms of international arbitration imagination has virtually no limits – nothing really prevents parties to an arbitration agreement from agreeing on an arbitration pursuant to the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules, in the Spanish…

Arbitration, Arbitration institution, Arbitration Institutions and Rules, Arbitration Proceedings, Corporate disputes, Pocket arbitrations, Russia

(Arbitration Center at the Institute of Modern Arbitration)/ /Leave a comment

One of the most significant changes that the new Russian Arbitration Law introduced, which has been in force for past eight months, relates to the requirement of Governmental authorization for establishing an arbitral institution (more discussion on this can be found in some of previous KAB posts available here, here, here). In particular, the Russian…

Arbitration Agreements, Arbitration Institutions and Rules, Enforcement, Expedited arbitration, ICC Arbitration, ICC Rules

(Hogan Lovells)/ /5 Comments

Expedited arbitration procedure, which allows procedural streamlining of arbitration proceedings, became widely accepted by arbitration institutions. The ICC followed this global trend by incorporating Expedited Procedure Rules into the ICC Rules which came into force on 1 March 2017 (see here). The incorporation of expedited procedures is a response to the need to control the…

Arbitration Institutions and Rules, ICSID, ICSID Arbitration, ICSID Convention, Investment, Investment agreements, Investment Arbitration, Investment protection, Investor, ISDS

(Stockholm University)/ /2 Comments

In October 2016, the ICSID advised the Member States of the ICSID Convention that it was beginning the fourth amendment process since the enactment of the definitive ICSID Arbitration Rules in 1967. The first amendment to the Rules took place in 1984 and mainly referred to the possibility to resort to national courts for provisional…

Appeal, Arbitration Awards, Domestic arbitration, Public Policy, Set aside an arbitral award, United States

(Herbert Smith Freehills)/ /3 Comments

On April 28, 2017, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (in a majority decision) affirmed the district court’s decision to set aside an award issued by a sole arbitrator finding that the award violated public policy.  The award was rendered in the context of mandatory arbitration of statutory claims under the…

Arbitral Tribunal, Arbitrator Challenges, Arbitrators, Code of Ethics, IBA Guidelines on Conflicts of Interest, Portugal

(BCH Advogados)/ /1 Comment

In many ways, Portugal is a remarkable arbitration-friendly jurisdiction. Not only a new UNICTRAL Model based law has been enacted a few years back now, but also its courts have proved to be very supportive of arbitration. The deference that they have been showing to the validity of the arbitration clause inserted in derivatives master…

Arbitral Award, Arbitration Act, Arbitration Agreement, Arbitrators, Seat of the arbitration, Summary procedure, Switzerland

(Meyerlustenberger Lachenal Ltd.)/ /Leave a comment

On 11 January 2017, the Swiss Federal Council proposed a revised version of the Swiss International Private Law Act (“SPILA”) relating to international arbitration (art. 176 et seq.) with a view to increasing the attractiveness of Switzerland as a place of arbitration while preserving the concise, liberal and flexible traits of the SPILA. More precisely,…

Disputed Territories, Investment, Investment protection, Investor

(Meitar Law Offices)/ /Leave a comment

On March 14th the Investment Treaty Forum at The British Institute of International and Comparative Law hosted a panel of experts to discuss practical and legal aspects of investments protection in the context of territorial disputes. Territorial disputes sometimes lead to the annexation of the territory of one state by another, of which the annexation…

Arbitration, China, ICSID, Investment Arbitration, Rule 41(5)

(The George Washington University Law School)/ /Leave a comment

On March 9, 2017, a three-person ICSID Tribunal rendered an Award in Ansung Housing Co., Ltd. v. People’s Republic of China.  The case marks the second time where China appears as a Respondent before an ICSID tribunal.  The first case was brought by a Malaysian company in May 2011, but that case was discontinued on…

Anti-arbitration, Bolivia, ISDS, Latin America

(Guevara & Gutiérrez S.C.)/ /2 Comments

As reported in the excellent piece by Alejandro López Ortiz and Gustavo Fernandes in “A Year of Legal Developments for International Arbitration in Latin America”, Bolivia may have taken a step back in State arbitration with the passing of its new act on arbitration in 2015. The article remarks the limitations to arbitrability introduced by…

Ad hoc arbitration, China, Free Trade Zones, kompetenz-kompetenz

, (AnJie Law Firm)/ /Leave a comment

On December 30, 2016, the Supreme People’s Court (“SPC”) issued a set of new Opinions. It covers an array of matters relating to legal measures to expedite the development of Free Trade Zones. (Opinions on Providing Judicial Protection for the Construction of Pilot Free Trade Zones, December 30, 2016). Among other matters, the SPC sought…

Arbitration, Arbitration Act, Australia, Transparency

(University of Sydney & Williams Trade Law)/ /2 Comments

On 22 March 2017, with minimal fanfare, the Civil Law and Justice Amendment Legislation Bill 2017 (“2017 Bill”) was introduced into the upper house of the federal Parliament. Buried within this omnibus Bill were four proposed reforms to the International Arbitration Act (IAA), renamed as such in 1989 when Australia was one of the first…

Consent, Insurance, Jurisdiction, Jurisdiction Clause, United States

, (BatesCareyLLP)/ /Leave a comment

The question of whether the jurisdictional grant in a “service of suit” clause overrides an otherwise valid and enforceable arbitration clause in the same agreement has been addressed by several courts in the United States. See McDermott Int’l, Inc. v. Lloyds Underwriters of London, 944 F.2d 1199 (5th Cir. 1991); Neca Ins., Ltd. v. Nat’l…

Emergency Arbitrator, India, Interim measures

(Twenty Essex) and (Shardul Amarchand Mangaldas)/ /6 Comments
YSIAC

The ability of a party to obtain urgent interim relief is central to the efficacy of any method of dispute resolution. In case of disputes that are subject to an arbitration agreement, until recently parties had only two options: either approach national courts for interim relief in support of the arbitration, or wait for the…

Enforcement, Investment, Investor, ISDS, Permanent Court of Arbitration, Singapore, UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules

(Fangda Partners), (Holborn Law LLC (in association with CMS Singapore)), and (CMS Hong Kong)/ /1 Comment

In early March 2017, the Singapore High Court released a judgment in which it considered an important question of enforcement of investor-state awards. In Josias Van Zyl v Kingdom of Lesotho [2017] SGHCR 2, AR Pereira was asked to decide whether an order to enforce a final award in a treaty dispute administered by the…