On 10 October 2022, the Secretary-General of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (“PCA”) accepted a challenge brought by Venezuela against the appointment of the Claimant’s appointee, Dr. Wolfgang Peter, in an investor state arbitration (PCA Case No. 2022-03) instituted by German Claimant, Lufthansa (“Challenge Decision”). The Challenge Decision is the latest in the series of…

An arbitrator’s authority to rely on a law that was not pleaded by the parties has been the subject of extensive discussions in the literature. Anecdotal evidence suggests that civil law jurisdictions broadly tend to adopt a more liberal approach to recognizing such authority in international arbitration, while common law jurisdictions, on the other hand,…