By Damon Vis-Dunbar 11 July 2009 Investment Treaty News (ITN) has posted the request for arbitration by the Swedish energy utility Vattenfall against the Government of Germany. In April Vattenfall brought the German government to international arbitration in a challenge to environmental restrictions imposed by the City of Hamburg on a coal-fired power plant under […]
By Elizabeth Whitsitt 8 June 2009 Oral hearings were held in May over a claim by an American forestry and land management company against the Government of Canada for damages of US$25 million for alleged breaches of NAFTA Chapter 11. At the heart of Merrill & Ring’s complaint is a complex regulatory regime in Canada […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 8 June 2009 European claimants and the government of South Africa have agreed to extend the suspension of their ICSID arbitration. The high-profile case was suspended at the end of March for two months, as the parties seek to resolve the dispute. The suspension is now due to run until June 19th. […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 8 June 2009 A petition lodged with the Philippine Supreme Court by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) argues that the investment chapter of the Japan-Philippines Economic Partnership Agreement (JPEPA) violates the Philippine constitution. The Japan-Philippines EPA—a comprehensive trade and investment agreement—grants Japanese the right to establish investments in sectors like public utilities, education, mass […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 8 June 2009 An ICSID tribunal authorized provisional measures on May 8th in an effort to stop the Government of Ecuador from seizing assets belong to the French oil company Perenco. Nonetheless, the state-owned Petroecuador attempted a week later to auction 1.4 million barrels of oil confiscated from Perenco, although no bidders […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 3 April 2009 A dispute related to oil derivatives entered into by Sri Lanka’s state-run petroleum utility has led at least one foreign bank to file arbitration proceedings against the Government of Sri Lanka. The state-run Ceylon Petroleum Corporation (CPC) entered into hedging contracts with a number of foreign and local banks […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 2 April 2009 (Note: a correction has been made to this article. An explanation is posted below). A group of European’s with a stake in South Africa’s granite-quarrying sector and the Government of South Africa have agreed to suspend arbitration proceedings* for two months. The claimants—several Italians and a Luxembourg corporation—allege that […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 26 March 2009 An American businessman has failed in his claim against Grenada under a 1996 oil and gas agreement, in a contract dispute conducted before an ICSID tribunal. Initiated in 2005, the ICSID claim was one of a host of legal avenues pursued by Jack J. Grynberg, the president and CEO […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 23 March 2009 A South African judicial ruling has opened the door for two plaintiffs to seek compensation for alleged expropriation of their mineral rights, in a case that echoes the complaints made by European investors in a pending international arbitration against South Africa under bilateral investment treaties. The judgment* comes in response […]
By Fernando Cabrera Diaz 4 February 2009 Bolivian President Evo Morales has claimed victory in the 25 January 2009 national referendum on a new constitution for the Andean nation. The constitution passed just days after the Bolivian leader announced his government was finally taking control of the Chaco Petroleum Company, as part of the ongoing […]
By Fernando Cabrera Diaz 5 January 2009 A tribunal has determined that it holds jurisdiction to hear a claim brought by Chevron Corporation against Ecuador for alleged violations of the Ecuador-United States bilateral investment treaty (BIT). Chevron claims that Ecuador violated the BIT by failing to deal fairly with multiple breach-of-contract cases filed against the […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 12 December 2008 A Canadian mining company and its American subsidiary have threatened the government of El Salvador with a lawsuit after it failed to receive regulatory approval to begin digging for gold and silver in an area some 65 km from San Salvador. The proposed mine has drawn intense opposition from […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 21 November 2008 Tanzania is losing large amounts of money from foreign investment in the mining sector due to low royalty rates and generous tax exemptions, while contracts with so-called stabilization clauses have locked the government into this tax regime for up to 50 years, says a report published by a consortium […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 24 October 2008 A previously unpublished 2006 partial award on jurisdiction in an arbitration between a Greek industrial group and the government of Serbia and Montenegro was released in October 2008, providing a fuller description of the little-publicized dispute. The row relates to a series of contracts between Mytilineos Holdings SA and […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 26 September 2008 A US citizen, Devincci Salah Hourani, has launched a lawsuit against the government of Kazakhstan over a failed contract to explore and exploit oil in the country. Mr. Hourani, who holds a 92% stake in the Kazakh firm Caratube International Oil Company (CIOC), has alleged breaches of the United […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 22 September 2008 A tribunal has accepted jurisdiction in a dispute that pits two petroleum companies against the Government of Ecuador, allowing the case to proceed to the merits stage. The two claimants, Occidental Petroleum Company (OPC) and Occidental Exploration and Production Company (OEPC), are seeking more than US$ 3 billion after […]
By Damon Vis-Dunbar 12 September 2008 A bid by a Canadian lumber company, Tembec, to vacate a NAFTA Chapter 11 award was dismissed in August by a United States District Court. This is the second time Tembec has turned to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. In 2005, Tembec made an […]
By Fernando Cabrera Diaz 29 August, 2008 The Ecuadorian government will consider contracts with oil companies terminated unless they remove the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Dispute (ICSID) as the venue of arbitration. The threat comes as the Andean nation considers domestic legal reforms which would make it unconstitutional for the country to be […]
By Elizabeth Whitsitt 25 July 2008 Tribunal considers whether a claim by an U.S. investor against Jordon is “manifestly without legal merit”, and rejects all but one of Jordan’s objections An ICSID tribunal has ruled on whether to uphold objections filed by the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan pursuant to Rule 41(5) of the ICSID Arbitration […]