A uniform regulation of substantive, procedural or ethical aspects of international commercial disputes through intergovernmental cooperation has proven to be an unachievable goal or hardly a goal at all. Nonetheless, while national laws are widely used as framework for international arbitration, a number of initiatives have emerged aiming at creating intrinsically international rules (soft law…
Factual background On 4 October 2013 the Tribunal constituted under Metal-Tech Ltd.’s claim against Republic of Uzbekistan (G. Kauffman-Kohler, C. von Wobeser, J. Townsend) issued the award on jurisdiction in the ICSID case ARB/10/03. The peculiar factual background of the case has been previously discussed here. The approach taken by the Tribunal in this case…
By Justin D’Agostino and Sean Izor In the past, arbitration laws and arbitral institutions in Asia have often been seen as less well developed when compared to their Western counterparts. However, just as Asia’s economies have grown at a rapid pace, catching up to (or surpassing) those of Europe and the United States, so has…
The numbers of energy and mining related disputes in Latin America constitute 67 out of 162 or 41% of the total ICSID cases within the region. In most of these disputes the respondents are Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador or Venezuela, which represent 52 out of 67 or 78% of the total energy and mining ICSID cases…
In recent years, Oxford University Press has devoted considerable effort to enhancing its transnational law list. In doing so, it has added several titles addressing international arbitration and investor-State topics. Among its more recent offerings is Commentaries on Selected Model Investment Treaties (hereinafter “Commentaries”) edited by Dr. Chester Brown. Commentaries is substantial. It comprises 895…
As leading jurisdictions around the world continue to establish national courts dedicated to the oversight of international arbitration issues, one wonders whether this is an idea whose time has come. This issue was previously discussed on this blog in September 2010. Much progress has been made in the intervening years. The most recent jurisdiction to…
and Luis Miguel Velarde Saffer Last December, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argument on BG Group v Argentina – an appeal from a controversial and much-criticized decision of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. The case arose out of emergency actions taken by the Republic of Argentina in late 2001 in the wake of…
By Manuel Castelo Branco and Raquel Galvão Silva The proposal prepared by the Committee for the modification of the Brazilian Arbitration Law was finally revealed and approved with some adjustments on 11 December 2013 by the Constitution, Justice and Citizenship Commission of the Federal Senate (the “Proposal”). The Proposal comes 17 years after the publication…
This is a response to yesterday’s post by Duarte Gorjão Henriques, “Incorporating IBA Guidelines Into A ‘Code of Ethics’: A Step Too Far?” My unambiguous answer to his title question is “right direction, not far enough!”. My response is from the perspective of an in-house counsel involved in negotiating dispute clauses in cross-border contracts. Henriques,…
The Board of Directors of the “ACL Arbitration Centre” (the Arbitration Centre of the “Portuguese Chamber of Commerce and Industry – Lisbon Commercial Association”) recently approved a new set of rules for arbitration proceedings administrated under its auspices. Along with the new rules, the Board also approved an “Arbitrator’s Code of Ethics”. Divided into 9…
By Roland Ziadé and Claudia Cavicchioli, Linklaters LLP On 17 December 2013, the Paris Court of Appeal added a new chapter to the Jnah vs. Marriott saga, when it ruled on an action to set aside an arbitral award issued on 3 February 2012 by which an arbitral tribunal denied jurisdiction over claims brought on…
The December 2013 decision of the English Commercial Court (the Court) in Habas Sinai Ve Tibbi Gazlar Istihsal Andustrisi AS and VSC Steel Company Ltd [2013] EWHC 4071 (Comm) (Habas) summarised the guidance provided in Sulamérica Cia Nacional De Seguros S.A. and others v Enesa Engenharia S.A [2012] EWCA Civ 638 (Sulamérica) and Arsanovia Ltd…
In an earlier post, it was reported that several domestic arbitral awards rendered in Qatar have been set aside by the national judges based on the necessity to be rendered in the name of His Highness The Emir of Qatar, otherwise these awards were considered in violation of public policy. Few weeks ago, a new…
On 23 January 2014, the Centre for Judicial Education and Research (CJER) at the City University of Hong Kong (CityUHK) hosted a lecture delivered by Ms. Olga Boltenko, Arbitral Clerk to Neil Kaplan CBE QC SBS. In addition to discussing the advantages and disadvantages of both ad hoc and institutional arbitration, the lecture covered various…
Allegations of fraud and corruption are increasingly encountered in international arbitrations but there is at times a perception that international arbitration, which is by nature a private and consensual dispute resolution mechanism, is ill-equipped to handle the challenges thrown up by such allegations. This is particularly so when looking at arbitral procedure. Is this perception…
On 20 December 2013, the final phase in the Indus Waters Kishenganga Arbitration was completed with the rendering of a Final Award by the seven-member Court of Arbitration (“Court”) tasked with resolving the latest water dispute between Pakistan and India. The Court was constituted in 2010 following a Request for Arbitration submitted by Pakistan under…
As you may already know, Gary Born is about to finalize a new edition of his magnum opus, International Commercial Arbitration. With 4,500 pages soon to be published (April 2014) in three comprehensive volumes, this revised work will provide practitioners and academics with the most comprehensive and up-to-date commentary on international commercial arbitration. We are…
The use of arbitration in large scale disasters – both natural and financial has increased in recent years. Alongside this increase has been the growing use of arbitration to resolve an increasingly wide array of claims in insurance, tort, and emergency public assistance. In the realm of financial claims, arbitration is used widely in the…
By Karen Mills, Mirèze Philippe and Ileana M. Smeureanu The views expressed are those of the authors alone and should not be regarded as representative of or binding upon the institution or the law firms they belong to. In the last twenty years there has been a proliferation of books, publications and articles about arbitration….
It has been over two years since the DC Circuit Court of Appeals (“Circuit Court”) vacated an award in a bilateral investment treaty arbitration (BG Group PLC v. Republic of Argentina (UNCITRAL)) concluding that the panel did not have authority to adjudicate the dispute because the claimant had not satisfied a pre-arbitration requirement, namely, litigating…
A recent amendment to Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Law No. 1 of 2008, the DIFC Arbitration Law, brings the DIFC into line with the New York Convention (on the recognition and enforcement of foreign arbitral awards, done in New York on 10 June 1958). DIFC Law No. 6 of 2013, the Arbitration Law Amendment…
A number of decisions of various national courts have dealt with the issue whether a competition law dispute may be referred to arbitration. Although the case law tends to favour a positive answer, it is still an issue that is being continuously brought up in litigation as an easy way out of arbitration clauses. This…
and Dr. Günther J. Horvath, Partner, Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer Should we blame the new entrants (or the old dogs) or are we experiencing a general lowering of ethical standards? The Chief Justice of Singapore, Sundaresh Menon, already has a reputation for addressing sensitive issues of international arbitration and fueling debate. At the Chartered Institute of…
Under the direction of the Swiss Arbitration Association (“ASA”), a recent questionnaire asked 82 of the world’s most prestigious arbitral institutions, among other questions, whether they had insurance for professional liability claims. There are very few empirical studies in this area, but the survey indicated that only few institutions made an effort to answer; and…
