• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.51-70
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• 2021

Chinese courts seem to be indifferent or ignorant of truncated arbitration. In other words, the Chinese court canceled the arbitration award made by truncated arbitration except for the Pingdingsan Case among the four arbitration cases related to the domestic arbitration award reviewed in this paper on the ground that it violated the composition of the arbitral tribunal or the arbitration procedure. A Chinese court has canceled the arbitration award by judging only based on the composition of the arbitral tribunal and the legal process of the violation of the arbitration procedure not by determining whether the domestic arbitration award made by the truncated arbitration meets the conditions for the application of truncated arbitration as stipulated in the Arbitration Rules. Moreover, it seems that the Chinese court made a serious error in the application of the relevant regulations in the Pingdingsan Case, which ruled that the truncated arbitration did not violate the legal process. In this case, the Chinese court admitted truncated arbitration under logic process that it was not necessary to wait until the final hearing to apply the truncated arbitraion because one arbitrator was absent before the final hearing, but the truncated arbitrator had already formed his/her opinion before the absence. However, in the case of Marshall Investment Corporation, a case related to foreign arbitration, the Chinese court rejected the approval and execution of the truncated arbitration award by strictly applying the laws and timing of the truncated arbitration. Since only one case has been identified in the main text, it is difficult to make a definitive judgment, but considering these cases, it seems to be that the Chinese courts apply different standards to domestic and foreign arbitration awards to determine the legality of truncated arbitration.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.3-24
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• 2009

Arbitration is the system of resolving disputes not by the adjudication of a national court but by the award of an arbitrator or arbitrators. To settle disputes by arbitration, it should be concluded that the arbitration agreement which is implied that the parties agree to submit to the arbitral award about all or certain disputes which have arisen or which may arise between them in respect of defined legal relationships. It is a matter for debate that which types of dispute may be resolved by arbitration. This problem is concerning the arbitrability of the subject-matter of a dispute. National laws establish the domain of arbitration. Each state decides which matters may or may not be resolved by arbitration in accordance with its own political, social and economic policy. According to Korean Arbitration Act Art. 3 (1), any dispute in private laws would be the object of arbitral proceedings. Therefore, the parties may agree to arbitrate disputes relating to the rights that they freely dispose of. Besides, they may have the freedom to choose arbitration as the form of a dispute resolution. Because arbitration is a private proceeding with public consequences that some types of dispute are reserved for national courts, whose proceedings are generally in the public domain. It is this sense that they may not be the object of arbitration. After all, it could be the object of arbitral proceedings that disputes which are capable of a settlement by arbitration.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.27 no.1
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• pp.131-160
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• 2017

When any investment dispute arises, the investor has to exhaust the local remedies available in the host state, and according to the agreement between the parties, the investor is filed to the ICSID arbitral tribunal to seek arbitral awards. At this time, if the arbitral tribunal decides that the investment agreement has been violated, it normally demands the host state to provide financial compensations to the investor for economic loss. According to the rules of the investment agreement, the host state is supposed to fulfill the arbitral awards voluntarily. If it is unwilling to provide financial compensations according to the arbitral awards, however, the investor may ask the domestic court of the host state for the recognition and enforcement of arbitral awards. In addition, if the host state is unwilling to fulfill arbitral awards on account of state immunity, the investor may ask his own country (state of nationality) for diplomatic protection and urge it to demand the fulfillment of arbitral awards. Effectiveness for pecuniary damages, a means to solve problems arising in the enforcement of investment arbitral awards, is found to be rather ineffective. For such cases, this study suggests an alternative to demand either a restitution of property or a corrections of violated measures subject to arbitral awards.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.133-156
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• 2017

The purpose of this paper is to take a countermeasure of the investment treaty arbitration that Lone Star claimed to the Korean government. In particular, this study suggests procedural measures to be prepared by the Korean government after the arbitration award. The actual remedy in ICSID arbitration is the annulment procedure of arbitration award. Therefore, this study analyzed the measures that the Korean government can prepare based on the annulment grounds: the inadequacy of the constitution of the arbitral tribunal, the excessive power of the arbitrator, the corruption of the arbitrator, and the serious violation of the rules. First, the Korean government should decide whether to proceed with the annulment procedure after the arbitration award. Second, if they decide to do it, they should review the grounds of annulment. For example, it is possible to analyze whether the relationship between the arbitrator and Lone Star can be properly in the constitution of the arbitral tribunal, whether Lone Star is eligible to apply for ICSID arbitration, or whether arbitration tribunal ignores the crucial evidence that can affect the arbitration award. Independently, the Korean government needs to discuss the investment arbitration appeal system in a long-term perspective.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.28 no.4
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• pp.131-152
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• 2018

On October 31, 2013, the Singapore Court of Appeals handed down a landmark decision in the case of PT First Media TBK v Astro Nusantara International and Others [2013] SGCA 57. The case arose out of an arbitration in Singapore involving the Malaysian conglomerate Astro and the Indonesian conglomerate Lippo, which culminated in a USD 250 million award in favor of Astro. The final award was given to three Astro subsidiaries who were not parties to the arbitration agreement, but who were joined in the arbitration pursuant to an application by Astro. Lippo then applied to the Singapore High Court to set aside the enforcement orders. The Court of Appeals, however, reversed the High Court's decision, and found that Astro was only entitled to enforce the awards. Also, the Court of Appeals undertook a detailed analysis of the use of active and passive remedies to defeat an arbitral award at the seat and the place of enforcement, respectively. It also touches on the innovation of forced joinders of third parties in arbitrations, which have garnered significant interest in the arbitration community. This decision is therefore expected to have a significant impact on the practice of international arbitration, including in relation to how awards can be enforced or defeated, as the case may be.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.3-22
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• 2023

The purpose of this study is to present implications by analyzing the Swiss Federal Court's annulment of the arbitration Awards in Court of Arbitration for Sport(CAS). As international interest in the sports sector increases, related disputes are also increasing. Therefore, the role of CAS specializing in sports disputes is becoming very important. In particular, the Swiss federal court's annulment of the arbitral awards made by the CAS could contribute significantly to the development of sports arbitration in the future. Looking at the case analyzed in this study, first of all, it is about the partiality of the arbitrator. The court judged that the arbitrator posted and shared racist articles on SNS, which could be sufficiently biased. Next, it is about the uncertainty of the arbitration clause. The arbitral award was finally canceled due to the issue of whether the CAS could make an arbitral award with jurisdiction over a clause that includes both dispute resolution through a sports organization and dispute handling in a national court. As a result of the analysis of this study, in the case of unclear arbitration provisions, it will be necessary to prepare an arbitration agreement. In addition, in the case of unclear arbitration provisions, it will be necessary to prepare a post-arbitration agreement. Finally, in order to revitalize sports arbitration, it will be necessary to train professional arbitrators in Korea, support them to work internationally, and establish specialized arbitration institutions.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.30 no.3
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• pp.3-19
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• 2020

With the advent of the Free Trade Agreement between Korea and the U.S. and an increase in trade volume between the two countries, the possibility of commercial disputes has escalated among international merchants. It has been well-known that arbitration as an alternative dispute resolution is an efficient way to resolve international commercial disputes. When arbitral awards are enforced in the judicial system, the court will inevitably have to be involved with the enforcement procedures. The court is a typical legal entity to confirm arbitral awards. Through a confirmation process, the winning party obtains the same legal status of final judgment rendered by the court. However, a winning party in arbitration will have to overcome a legal hurdle in the enforcement process of arbitral awards. This article aims to investigate how the courts control the arbitration practices and what the basic legal issues in the enforcement of arbitral awards are. The US Federal Arbitration Act is investigated, while relevant cases are reviewed and updated for legal analysis.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.76
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• pp.21-47
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• 2017

Interim measures by an arbitral tribunal aim to protect the parties' rights before or during arbitral proceedings for avoiding frustration of the final award in international commercial disputes. Even though decisions of the interim measure are expected to be performed by parties directly during the arbitral processing, it is not easy to be provided by the arbitral tribunals cause of lack the power to enforce their decisions directly against the parties. Particular court supports mechanism for enforcement directly to assistance to arbitral tribunal's decisions. Decisions on interim measures are provisional. Even though the arbitration is ongoing to request interim measure directly to the arbitral tribunal, relevant courts are able to ensure effective relief cause by the difficulty of limited rights of the arbitral tribunal. In this time both revised Korean Arbitration Act in 2016 and UNCITRAL 2006 revised Model Law are complemented to attach articles for recognition and enforcement of interim measures by arbitral tribunal during the arbitration processing. It could be possible to enforcement of decisions of interim measures by arbitral tribunal on the revised arbitration law. In this paper it is considered the problems and alternatives on related applicable articles and articles of recognition and enforcement for the interim measures by arbitral tribunal under the revised UNCITRAL Model law and Korean Arbitration Act.

• Journal of Arbitration Studies
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• v.25 no.2
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• pp.97-118
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• 2015

As China has quickly emerged as a global economic power, the total number of international commercial disputes arbitrated by Chinese arbitral institutions has increased dramatically. Along with this, the annulment procedure of arbitral awards in China have been newly brought to the fore. In accordance with the historical background and the demand of the times, the Chinese annulment procedure of arbitral awards reveals distinctive Chinese features. Although it was enacted in the face ofof an unwarranted prejudice against the dispute settlement system by arbitration as well as a deep mistrust of domestic arbitral institutions, the annulment procedure of arbitral awards showed a certain degree of justification and rationality in its initial stages of legislation. However, it is also the case that it has not adapted well to new domestic or foreign arbitration circumstances in the last twenty years. At present, there is a keen interest in revisions to and debates on arbitration law of China. It is necessary to take an active part in the amendment discussion and process of arbitration law. Moreover, we need to reform the annulment procedure of arbitral awards in order to meet the global trend of arbitration law.

• THE INTERNATIONAL COMMERCE & LAW REVIEW
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• v.33
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• pp.145-164
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• 2007

The Arbitration costs provided in Article 31 consist of arbitrators' fees, arbitrators' expenses, ICC administrative expenses, expenses of experts appointed by the Arbitral Tribunal, and parties' costs. Among them the first three items are independently determined by the Court in accordance with the Scale, while another two items are determined by the arbitrator and each party. The three items determined by the Court are communicated by Secretariat to the Arbitral Tribunal for inclusion in the award following the approval of the draft submitted to the Court. Also the final award may decide which of the parties shall bear them or in what proportion they shall be borne by the parties. According to Article 31(3), the arbitrators have complete jurisdiction or discretion to allocate the costs. Three common approaches are as follows; First, all of the costs are borne by the losing party. Second, all of the costs are allocated in proportion to the outcome of the case. Third, all of the costs determined by the Courts are shared equally by the parties and both parties bear their own costs. But, both parties may include intentions in accordance with the principle of party autonomy. For example, if the parties wish to ensure that the arbitration costs be shared equally and that the arbitrator make no allocation of costs or fees, the following sentence could be added to the arbitration clause in their contract. "All costs and expenses of the arbitrators [and the arbitral institution] shall be borne by the parties equally; each party shall bear the costs and expenses, including attorneys' fees, of its own counsel, experts, witness and preparation and presentation of its case" And also, if the parties wish expressly to link any allocation of costs, and fees to the result of the award the following could be added to the arbitration clauses. "The arbitrators may award to the prevailing party, if any, as determined by the arbitrators, its costs and expenses, including attorneys' fees"