On 15 January 1986, Ecuador signed the Convention on the Settlement of Investment Disputes between States and Nationals of other States (“ICSID Convention”). During President Rafael Correa´s administration (2007-2017), President Correa publicly expressed his hostility towards the ICSID Convention and the international investment protection system. In 2008, Ecuador denounced over a third of its bilateral…
The relationship between commercial arbitration and European human rights law raises a number of conceptually difficult issues. How can the State be regarded as responsible at all for conduct of private arbitral proceedings? And how does the concept of an independent and impartial tribunal apply to a decision-making body appointed by the parties themselves? The…
In the wake of BEG (see Part I), what conclusions can we draw about the place of arbitral independence and impartiality in the ECtHR’s Article 6 jurisprudence? State Responsibility and Private Arbitral Proceedings Is a contracting State now in principle answerable under the Convention for the conduct of all private arbitral proceedings taking place…
The Vienna International Arbitral Centre (VIAC) has further strengthened its arbitration offering by adopting brand new, stand-alone investment arbitration and mediation rules, the VIAC Rules of Investment Arbitration and Mediation (VRI), which entered into force on 1 July 2021. The VRI apply to disputes involving a State, a State-controlled entity or an intergovernmental organization that…
Conflicts of interest between parties and arbitrators are common in arbitration proceedings. However, the academic community has not yet examined whether arbitral institutions may also run into conflicts of interest. This post will deal with this question and also examine measures that can mitigate any such risks of conflicts of interest for arbitral institutions. The…
An increasing number of anti-arbitration injunctions applications have come before the Malaysian courts within the last two years. Anti-arbitration injunctions can take various forms but are essentially judicial orders restraining the initiation or continuation of arbitration proceedings in Malaysia or, as the case may be, a foreign jurisdiction. What has emerged from the Malaysian courts…
In a judgment dated 22 June 2021, the Paris Court of Appeal ruled that liability claims against arbitrators fall within the “arbitration exception” of Article 1(2)(d) of the Brussels I recast regulation, leading to the application of French private international law rules to determine the competent courts. The Paris Court of Appeal further considered that…
The Singapore Court of Appeal (“CA”) recently handed down CBX and anor v CBZ and ors [2021] SGCA(I) 3 (“CBX”), setting aside, exceptionally, the awards.1)The views expressed in this article are solely the views of the authors, and are not representative of the organisations they are affiliated with. Significantly, the law was clarified, to a…
The institution of emergency arbitration (EA), in general, and its usage in investment treaty-based disputes, in particular, is a relatively new procedural tool. In investment disputes, EA has reportedly been carried out in practice only under the Rules of the Arbitration Institute of the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce (the “SCC Rules”). Conducting EA proceedings in…
There have been significant legal developments in recent times in Australia concerning the proper choice of law applicable to an arbitration agreement. Cases have centred on how to give effect to parties’ choice. But there are other laws which, despite not being chosen by the parties as the law applicable to the arbitration agreement, may…
In a series of recent posts (Part I, Part II and Part III), I argued that states should not ratify the Hague Choice of Court Agreements Convention (“Convention”) and, if they had already done so, that they should denounce the Convention. Two good friends, Trevor Hartley and João Ribeiro-Bidaoui, recently responded on Kluwer Arbitration Blog…
This post continues from Part I. Party Autonomy and Consent: How the Convention Undermines Them My previous posts argued that the Convention undermines vital protections that existing law provides for party autonomy and genuine consent. In response, Mr. Ribeiro argues that the Convention advances notions of party autonomy: it supposedly serves to “enable parties to…
Gary Born, in a three-part series in Kluwer Arbitration Blog last month, addressed why States should not participate in the 2005 Hague Convention on Choice Of Court Agreements (“Hague Convention”). We assume that readers are familiar with Mr. Born’s posts (available as Part I, Part II, and Part III), and so we will confine ourselves to recalling this…
The HCCH 2005 Choice of Court Convention (“Convention“), adopted over fifteen years ago, has recently become the subject of damning criticism from Gary Born in a series of posts published on the Blog (see Part I, Part II, and Part III). In the series, Born dramatically suggests that states bound by the Convention should denounce…
Founded in 2013, the New York International Arbitration Center (“NYIAC”) is a non-profit organization that promotes and enhances the conduct of international arbitration in New York, offers educational programming, and operates arbitration hearing facilities in New York City. Rekha Rangachari is NYIAC’s current Executive Director. In addition to her work with NYIAC, Rekha holds leadership…
Where C commences an arbitration against a non-existent entity E, and D defends the arbitration in the guise of E, can an award rendered in favour of E be enforced by D against C?1)This article is written in the author’s personal capacity. The opinions expressed are entirely the author’s own, and do not reflect the…
The legal industry has benefited tremendously from recent technological advancements, leading to the expansion of Legal Tech as the driving force for progress in this field. More and more tools – more or less Artificial Intelligence (“AI”)1)Generally, the term “Artificial Intelligence (AI)” refers to machines capable of replicating human intelligence. However, the technological status quo…
On 30 May 2021 the fifth webinar of the series “The Rising Arbitrator’s Challenge: Navigating the Premise and Perils of Your First Appointment(s)” covering Australia and New Zealand was presented by ACICA45 in collaboration with the Rising Arbitrators Initiative (RAI). RAI was created in September 2020 to support arbitration practitioners under 45 who have either…
Although Taiwan’s legislative and judicial practices already conform to the spirit of the New York Convention (“Convention”) and the Model Law, it appears that non-Taiwanese parties nevertheless remain hesitant to arbitrate in Taiwan. The necessity of becoming a Model Law jurisdiction arises from Taiwan’s inability to accede to the New York Convention. Hence an institutional…
James Crawford was the pre-eminent international lawyer of his generation. Throughout his career as arbitrator, judge, advocate, and counsellor he defied so-called “realists” who, when they addressed international law, often claimed there is no such thing. Crawford was born in Adelaide, South Australia in 1948 and made his career at the intersection of academia and…
On 9 July 2021, the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law, better known as UNCITRAL, reached another milestone in its 55-year history. The Commission adopted the 2021 Expedited Arbitration Rules (“EAR”) (subject to completion, without objection, of a silence procedure). The EAR modify certain aspects of the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules (“UAR”) and must be…
In 2019, Mainland China and Hong Kong entered into a groundbreaking bilateral arrangement regarding interim measures for arbitration, i.e., Arrangement Concerning Mutual Assistance in Court-ordered Interim Measures in Aid of Arbitral Proceedings by the Courts of the Mainland and of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (the “Arrangement”).1)Thanks to Lingming Xu for his contribution to…
The economic havoc wreaked by the Covid-19 pandemic has resulted in a 10-year high of corporate bankruptcies in the United States in 2020. While bankruptcy levels across Europe have fallen amid the pandemic, a sharp spike in corporate bankruptcies is expected as economic support programs phase out in the coming months. This will increase the…
The Achmea saga has taken yet another twist. In a recent communication to the Dutch Parliament, the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate disclosed that it initiated “anti-arbitration” proceedings before the German courts on 11 May 2021 to “avert” two ECT-based ICSID arbitrations brought against it by the German energy companies RWE and Uniper (“Communication”)….
