News and analysis on trade policy in Europe
Thursday, January 21, 2021
The Dutch Parliament is in the process of preparing to ratify CETA, the flagship free trade agreement between the European Union and Canada. And it’s turning out to be a dramatic process, although confidence has grown that the first vote next week will be positive. CETA is provisionally in force …
On 24 October 2019 the European Commission announced that the EU member states had reached agreement on a plurilateral treaty for the termination of all ca. 190 intra-EU bilateral investment treaties or BITs. This agreement marks the culmination of the European Commission’s efforts over the past decade to eliminate intra-EU …
This week more than one hundred states and sixty non-governmental organisation agreed in principle on several incremental reforms of the current investor-state dispute settlement system – or ISDS – at a meeting in Vienna. As readers will recall, at the last meeting of Working Group III of United National Commission of …
Having obtained the green light from the European Court of Justice for the CETA investment court, the European Commission has wasted no time in proceeding to reform the Energy Charter Treaty. The reform push also covers oil and gas pipeline transit – which will grate with Russia.
On Tuesday (April 30), the European Court of Justice (ECJ) issued its long-awaited opinion on the question raised by Belgium whether the investment court system (ICS), which encompasses a tribunal and appellate tribunal, is compatible with EU law. The approval of the ECJ not only removes the remaining obstacle for …
At its last meeting in New York UNCITRAL Working Group III on reforms of investor-state dispute settlement pushed back on proposals for an EU-sponsored multilateral investment court (MIC). But participants managed to agree to continue working on a general approach to reforms and to specific changes. More than 100 governments …
UNCITRAL Working Group III on reforms of investor-state dispute settlement is meeting in New York this week. The focus of the discussions will be the EU’s proposal for a multilateral investment court – also known as MIC. While it’s not clear the EU’s court idea will gain traction, there is …
The long-awaited legal ‘opinion’ of Advocate General Yves Bot of the Court of Justice of the European Union regarding the compatibility with EU law of the investment court system included in bloc’s trade deal with Canada gives it a clean slate. The ICS serves as the blueprint for the EU’s …
The EU’s international investment protection policies are not 100% consistent, Nikos Lavranos concludes after examining the relevant chapters of the bloc’s trade agreements with Vietnam and Singapore and CETA. The perceived inconsistency in existing bilateral investment agreements and the jurisprudence of international arbitral tribunals established under those BITs have been …
The UNCITRAL-hosted reform process of investor-state dispute settlement launched last November in Vienna is dominated by the EU, Canada and Mauritius. It is a process driven by governments and less by experts, with countries like the US and Japan finding themselves in a minority. Nikos Lavranos reports back on a …
