In 2017 Spain was ordered to pay Eiser €128 million on account of its failure to afford fair and equitable treatment. This award was subsequently annulled because the claimant-appointed arbitrator omitted to disclose a professional relationship with the claimants’ damages expert which led to, inter alia, the tribunal being improperly constituted. The full costs of…
I .The Annulment of an Arbitral Award under Ecuadorian Law Pursuant to article 30 of the Arbitration and Mediation Law (AML), arbitral awards are final and binding for the parties. In other words, parties cannot file recourses to challenge an award, with the exception of a clarification or extension petition before the arbitral tribunal. However,…
Corruption, annulment of arbitral awards and court intervention mark the main developments for 2020 in Latin America. Our contributors this year reported on the most important judicial decisions and legislative measures impacting the legal framework of various jurisdictions in the region. A new ‘hot topic’ arising from the COVID-19 pandemic is the interplay between arbitration…
The Chilean Supreme Court recently issued a decision that, on its face, respects party autonomy in international arbitration. But, it could do more harm than good. On September 14, 2020, the Chilean Supreme Court (the “Court”) entered a final judgement in the case CCF SUDAMERICA SPA, Rol Nº 19568-2020 (“CCF Sudamericana” or the “Decision”). The…
On 11 August 2020, the Court of Appeals of the state of São Paulo, Brazil, annulled an arbitral award1)1ª Câmara Reservada de Direito Empresarial do Tribunal de Justiça de São Paulo. Apelação Cível no. 1056400-47.2019.8.26.0100 [Appeal no. 1056400-47.2019.8.26.0100]. on the grounds that the chair of the arbitral tribunal had failed to timely disclose his appointment…
12th August 2020 marks the 21st anniversary of the Indonesia’s Law Number 30 Year 1999 on Arbitration and Alternative Dispute Resolution (“Arbitration Law”).1)Any comments/views expressed in this article are those of the authors only. They do not reflect the views of KarimSyah Law Firm or AIAC unless otherwise stated. Culture wise, many countries, especially Indonesia, venerate…
In a recent judgement, the Swedish Supreme Court rejected an appeal against the decision of the first instance which set aside an arbitral award in part due to a procedural error of the arbitral tribunal. The particularity of this case stems from the fact that the procedural error derived from an earlier procedural order of…
In a ‘ground-breaking’ precedential decision, Al-Kharafi v Libya (Judgment No. 39 of 130 JY, 3 June 2020), the Cairo Court of Appeal in Egypt ruled that it can review an arbitral award for fundamental errors of law that amount to a violation of public policy or equity and justice notions. The decision relates to an…
Serafín García Armas and Karina García Gruber v. Venezuela and Clorox Spain v. Venezuela are different in many aspects. García Armas relates to dual nationality, while Clorox relates to protected investment. However, they have a common feature: Article 1(2) of the Spain–Venezuela BIT was key to their developments. That article defines investments as “any kind…
In a recent decision, in Eiser Infrastructure Limited and Energia Solar Luxemburg S.À.R.L. v Kingdom of Spain (ICSID Case No. ARB/13/36), an International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) ad-hoc committee decided to annul an award in its entirety. The reason being a conflict of interest. For the first time in ICSID’s history, an…
The Paris Court of Appeal considers that the arbitral awards annulled at the place of the arbitration do not amount to a valid cause for refusal of enforcement in France. Recently, the Court specified that whether the interests at stake are international or national does not change this position. Background of the Dispute On…
The Costa Rican court in charge of deciding upon arbitral matters recently set aside an award on the ground of the arbitrator’s failure to disclose a circumstance that could be found in the case file. In a five-page judgment dated June 27, 2019,1)Judgment from 27 June 2019, PH Chucás S.A. v. Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad,…
Introduction There have been three main long-standing controversies concerning arbitration in Egypt. First, interest rates and whether they are truly part of Egyptian substantive public policy.1)Ismail Selim, ‘Egyptian Public Policy as a Ground for Annulment and Refusal of Enforcement of Arbitral Awards’ (2016) 3 BCDR International Arbitration Review, Issue 1, pp. 65–79. Second, whether the…
The United Nations Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (“New York Convention”) prescribes mandatory, uniform international rules for the recognition and enforcement of international arbitration agreements and awards in the Contracting States. Pursuant to Article V(1)(e) of the New York Convention, an award may be denied recognition and enforcement by the…
Introduction The enforcement bar is becoming more specialized. This development follows the trend in U.S. litigation towards increasing specialization and the growth of niche practice industries; but it also stems from specific changes to the enforcement regime that are addressed in this article and that have important implications for the life-cycle of an international arbitration….
Introduction This post explores whether a Tribunal may refer to an annulled arbitral award in support of its factual findings or legal assessments. Although a simple reference to annulled awards lies outside the context of any obligation for the Tribunal in terms of res judicata and stare decisis, this quest is aligned with annulled awards’…
In a decision from June 6, 2018, the Third Chamber of the Paraguayan Court of Appeal (the “Court”) decided an annulment application, recognizing that issues of illegality and corruption are arbitrable, as long as such decision does not imply the imposition of sanctions, something that is left to the local criminal courts1)Recurso de Nulidad interpuesto…
In what should be deemed as an authentic legislative milestone, on July 4, 2018 the Argentine House of Representatives approved the International Commercial Arbitration bill (previously passed by the Senate in 2017). The bill became a law and entered into force as Act 27,449 after its publication in the Official Gazette on July 26, 2018….
On 5 April 2018, the Civil and Criminal Chamber of the Madrid High Court of Justice (Tribunal Superior de Justicia de Madrid, TSJM) set aside an arbitral award as contrary to public policy, because the challenged award contained “an unreasonable assessment of the evidence and unreasonable failure to apply applicable rules”.1) Competent Court to deal…
On December 12, 2017, the Supreme Court of Japan rendered its first decision on the setting aside of an arbitral award based on an arbitrator’s failure to disclose facts allegedly constituting a conflict of interest, reasoning that, in order for the award to be set aside on this ground, it is necessary that the arbitrator…
The judicial review of arbitral awards has been a continuous topic of discussion amongst scholars and legislators. Considering the major effects of the seat of the arbitration in annulment proceedings, even when the arbitral award is in principle final and binding, local legislators are faced with the need to balance the aim of assuring the…
Several recent circuit-level decisions have shown that U.S. courts are willing to review a foreign court’s annulment of an arbitration award to determine whether the annulment conflicts with U.S. public policy. This exercise inherently involves normative judgments and leads to the question of whether U.S. courts may be “out of their depth” in making such…
Recently, it was reported that after 14 years since Zimbabwe had illegally evicted Dutch farmers from their farms, it finally agreed to pay the damages awarded under the ICSID award, which dates back in 2009. In the Funnekotter et al case, the arbitral tribunal rejected Zimbabwe’s necessity defence, which was based on the claimed need…
The finality of an award is a key feature and attraction of arbitration as a method of dispute resolution. When an award is annulled at the seat, however, enforcing courts in secondary jurisdictions must decide between enforcing the award or honoring the seat-court’s nullification. This issue assumes significance in light of the recent judgment of…
