In January 2018, Kluwer Arbitration Blog will enter its 9th year of existence and we are pleased to see the Blog developing into such a successful forum of international arbitration. The scope of the Blog – as unveiled in 2009 – is to include high quality discussions on international arbitration, commercial and investment related, and…
On 30 December 2016, the Supreme People’s Court of China (“SPC”) released Opinion on Providing Judicial Protection for the Development of the Pilot Free-Trade Zones (“Opinion”), which was regarded as allowing ad hoc arbitration in China. On 23 March 2017, the Management Committee of Hengqin New Zone and Zhuhai Arbitration Commission (“ZAC”) jointly published the…
Arbitration Industry Promotion Act of Korea In South Korea, the Arbitration Industry Promotion Act (“Promotion Act”), which was enacted on 27 December 2016, finally took effect on 28 August 2017. The purpose of this legislation is to promote arbitral procedures within Korea by expanding required infrastructures such as dispute resolution facilities, arbitration professionals, arbitration system,…
The specter of communism that was once lingering over the Europe has long faded away, and the alliance, one of the biggest socialist experiments in the history of mankind, that stood to safeguard and promote its ideals has failed. In 1991 out of the remains of the Soviet Union emerged five independent Central Asian states….
Introduction This short note briefly touches upon two enforcement issues pertaining to third-party funding in international arbitration, one more ventilated than the other. It is hoped that our comments on these issues will be perceived as an insightful contribution to an already ignited debate, with the caveat that we provide for a discussion rather than…
New Zealand now officially opposes investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), thanks to the election of a new centre-left Labour-led coalition government that took office in October 2017. In a post-Cabinet press conference on 31 October, Prime Minister Jacinda Adern announced that: “We remain determined to do our utmost to amend the ISDS provisions of TPP. In…
Third-party funding has become a subject of major discussion over the past few years. It is clear that third-party funding is here to stay, and thus the question today is not whether it is going to grow, but rather where the opportunities are likely to be. Third-party funding: Definition and objectives Third-party funding is an…
Multi-party arbitrations arising out of multiple agreements between multiple parties containing different arbitration clauses give rise to complex issues to be answered by arbitral tribunals and Courts. While negotiating an agreement, parties rarely take into consideration the impact on the dispute resolution mechanism because of subsequent agreements with new parties. In a multi-party multi-agreement scenario,…
In the forty years since new visions and challenges for the administration of American justice were offered at the 1976 Pound Conference, a Quiet Revolution has altered the landscape of public and private dispute resolution around the world. (See Living the Dream of ADR) Recently, a series of day-long meetings styled as the Global Pound…
Introduction Section 10 of the Singapore International Arbitration Act (“IAA”), allows a party to challenge an arbitral tribunal’s determination of its jurisdiction. Section 10(7) further provides that, where the Court rules under section 10 that the tribunal has no jurisdiction, it may make an order as to the costs of the arbitral proceedings. I was…
Arbitration practice is on the rise in Nigeria. On the 3rd of November, 2017, the Nigeria Branch of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (UK) inducted 219 Associates, 58 Members and 20 Fellows into the branch. The branch also boasts a burgeoning class of Chartered Arbitrators. The expectation is that the number of inductees will continue…
The IBA Guidelines on Conflicts of Interest focus on when an arbitrator should disclose potential conflicts, as well as when he or she should simply not accept appointment. For the most part, they do not specifically address the potential disqualification of an arbitrator. Nonetheless, the Guidelines, even though non-binding, have become quite influential in the…
In 2012, the Permanent Court of Arbitration [“PCA”] in the Chagos Decision entertained a challenge to an arbitrator’s impartiality in an inter-state arbitration between Mauritius and the United Kingdom (“UK”) (analyzed here) . The PCA had to decide the appropriate standard for impartiality of arbitrators, and in the process, deal with the novel question of…
Currently, several dozen arbitral claims have been lodged by investors from an EU Member-State against another EU Member-State based on the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT). These so-called intra-EU ECT-based arbitrations seem to be increasing, despite attempts by the European Commission to halt them. So far, neither the Respondent-States nor the Commission (as amicus curiae) have…
Third-party funding remains a hot topic in arbitration, which is understandable considering its complexity and that its accompanying issues often have major implications for arbitral procedure. This fall, the ICCA-Queen Mary Task Force on third-party funding in international arbitration released its “draft,” touching upon a number of contemporary issues vis-á-vis third-party funding, all of which…
International arbitration is taking a giant step forward as part of the global movement to protect human rights. A drafting team, with expertise in international investment, arbitration, human rights, supply chains and other issues, is being assembled to prepare a set of rules. The project is the culmination of several years of work exploring the…
Adoption of the EU Council Directive on Tax Dispute Resolution Mechanisms in the European Union on 10 October 2017 is a milestone in international tax dispute resolution. The Directive offers a uniform mechanism to address tax treaty disputes among EU member states that meets the BEPS Action 14 minimum standard, and largely renders the arbitration option in…
In June 2017, the Fourth European Anti-Money Laundering Directive (the “Fourth EU Directive” (EU) 2015/849) was transposed into German law. The regime was further tightened, its scope was extended and new features, such as the transparency register, were introduced. With the fifth European Anti-Money Laundering Directive already on the horizon, more changes are to come….
The development of effective instruments for collective redress is a widely discussed topic among European politicians, consumer protectors, legal scholars and dispute resolution lawyers. The professional discourse was recently fuelled by the Volkswagen emission scandal (also referred to as “emissiongate” or “dieselgate”), which, at least in the US, was already subject to collective actions. Another…
After the US election, it was a certainty that in my inbox every morning there was at least one, if not more, email with a discussion on the future of arbitration in our changing society today. And this debate has continued in halls of university law schools to GAR events to law firm seminars. I…
The long-yearned for reform of the Arbitration Act has finally gotten off the starting block. An ad hoc commission has submitted its reform proposal (Proposal), to the scrutiny of the Ministry of Justice (for the full text of the Proposal see here; see also Guido Alpa et al., Un progetto di riforma delle ADR, Jovene,…
Last year I posted on the New Zealand High Court’s decision in Ngāti Hurungaterangi & Ors v Ngāti Wahiao [2016] NZHC 1486. The High Court rejected the plaintiffs’ claim that an arbitral award was inadequately reasoned and should be set aside. The Court described the panel’s reasoning as “undeniably sparse” but held by a “fine…
Cryptocurrency is a term that is becoming increasingly familiar. But how many of us have considered its implications for the world we live in—let alone for the practice of international arbitration? Cryptocurrencies—essentially digital cash—and the blockchain technology on which they are built, have the potential to revolutionise the way funds are raised, traded and stored….
The international economic order is today bound together through a network of bilateral (and multilateral) investment treaties which provide investors with a variety of protections. Such Bilateral investment treaties (“BITs”) are a relatively young species dating back to 1959’s Pakistan-Federal Republic of Germany BIT. While the exact content of BITs varies by agreement, most contain…
