Inter-State Arbitration

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Can’t Fight the Moonlight? Actually, You Can: ICJ Judges to Stop Acting as Arbitrators in Investor-State Disputes

The earthquake started in earnest in November 2017. At its epicentre was a report, published in November 2017 by two researchers at the International Institute for Sustainable Development ("IISD"). In the report, titled "Is 'Moonlighting' a Problem? The role of ICJ Judges in ISDS", researchers Nathalie Bernasconi-Osterwalder and Martin Dietrich Brauch analysed the contents of several public databases of ISDS cases, and found that at least seven judges at the International Court of Justice ("ICJ" or the "Court") at the time of publishing (and 13 former judges) had worked (or were working at the time of the report) as arbitrators in treaty-based investor state dispute settlement cases during their terms at the ICJ. Crunching the numbers further, the two IISD researchers looked at the amount of treaty-based cases in which ICJ judges had served as arbitrators. They compared the number against the 817 treaty-based ISDS cases known as of July 2017. The results were surprising: ICJ judges had sat as arbitrators in roughly 10% of all known investment treaty cases during their tenure.

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New Restrictions on Arbitral Appointments for Sitting ICJ Judges

Editor’s Note: This week, in a trio of posts by Callum Musto, Marie Davoise, and Frederic Sourgens, we facilitate discussion on the nature of the International Court of Justice’s judicial function, and the occasional international arbitration appointments accepted by individual judges of the World Court. In view of H.E. President Yusuf’s October 2018 report to the U.N.

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Insights from the Bifurcation Order in the Ukraine vs. Russia Arbitration under Annex VII of UNCLOS

By Procedural Order of 20 August 2018 (“Bifurcation Order”), the arbitral tribunal established under Part XV and Annex VII of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) in the “Dispute Concerning Coastal State Rights in the Black Sea, Sea of Azov, and Kerch Strait (Ukraine v. the Russian Federation)” ordered a bifurcation of…

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Crimea Investment Disputes: are jurisdictional hurdles being overcome too easily?

In February-March 2014, Crimea experienced what is here neutrally referred to as a ‘change of effective sovereign’ (as conceded by Ukraine itself). Subsequent events have given rise to at least nine investment claims by Ukrainian nationals against Russia in connection with their investments in Crimea made prior to the ‘change of effective sovereign’. Substantively, all cases pivot on…

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China leans in on international adjudication: Why Beijing’s answer to defeat will be more forceful engagement

This year China might suffer the third in a string of stinging defeats at international tribunals that would then cover trade, investment, and law of the sea matters. Contrary to persistent expectations in some policy circles, China’s leaders will not opt for withdrawal. They have resolved to make existing mechanisms work for China, and shape global governance by…

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