Transnational Notes

The Center hosts, together with the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC) and NYIAC, a webinar on the “Coronavirus and Exemption of Liability” on Friday, June 5, 2020 at 8:00 AM to 9:15 AM ET (New York Time).

COVID-19 has caused severe disruptions to international transactions and projects and has led many to seek relief from their contractual obligations. The webinar will address the following issues: Do international instruments such as the UNIDROIT Principles of International Commercial Contracts and the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG) provide relief for parties affected by COVID-19?

Force majeure certificates have been requested by parties affected by COVID-19 and issued by chambers of commerce in various countries. Do such certificates have any value in an arbitral proceeding?

How are the principles of force majeure and economic hardship treated under various legal systems and under public international law?

Panelists include Ms. Chiann Bao, Mr. Nigel Blackaby QC, Professor Franco Ferrari, and Dr. Jean Ho. The panel is moderated by Ms. Lucy Reed.

To attend, please submit the webinar registration information here.

The Center hosts, in conjunction with the Commercial Law Centre at Harris Manchester College, Oxford, the Centre for International Dispute Resolution at Bucerius Law School, the National University of Singapore, and the Centre for Commercial Law Studies at Queen Mary University of London a webinar entitled “Arbitration online: law and practice”. The event will take place on 20 May 2020, from 7.00 am. – 9.00 am (NY time).

The event will address the question of whether arbitration can ‘go online’ while preserving its promise of reliable and enforceable results. In this online event international arbitration scholars and practitioners will discuss the most important legal challenges and best practice responses associated with the delivery of arbitration online in the COVID-19 crisis and beyond. The event will address, among other issues, the validity and enforceability of the arbitral award; the right to be heard and ordre public: online hearings as “hearings” in legal terms; how to assure consent of the parties to online proceedings; the arbitral tribunals’ powers to order online hearings absent party consent; specific online “guerrilla tactics” and possible sanctions; the taking evidence online; best online practices to safeguard the arbitration procedure and the award.

You can register here: https://law-oxford.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_8MEHAFyZQImzXj1muaGrZQ

Please note that the event will be recorded and proceedings may be made publicly available after the event. By registering you consent to this.

On 8 May 2020, the Center hosted, together with the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC), a webinar on the “CISG in International Arbitration.” The seminar took stock of the impact of CISG on international arbitration on the occasion of the Convention’s 40^th anniversary. The panelists examined how CISG applies in arbitration and how that differs from CISG’s application in courts, how economic hardship is treated under CISG, how arbitral awards have applied the substantive provisions of CISG, as well as CISG issues in setting aside applications before the Singapore courts.

The webinar was recorded to allow those unable to take part in the seminar to benefit from the talks by the panelists (Justice Francesco Cortesi from the Italian Supreme Court; Professor Gary F. Bell, National University of Singapore; Professor Franco Ferrari, the Center’s Director;  Professor Friedrich Rosenfeld, Global Professor at NYU/Paris; Professor Marco Torsello, Verona University; Mr. Alvin Yeo, Chairman & Senior Partner of WongPartnership LLP in Singapore) and the ensuing discussion. The recording is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmtNzBk4cfM

The Center hosts, together with the Singapore International Arbitration Centre (SIAC), a webinar on the “CISG in International Arbitration.” 

On the 40th anniversary of the United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG), SIAC and NYU Law jointly present a webinar to take stock of the impact of CISG on international arbitration. The panelists will examine how CISG applies in arbitration and how that differs from CISG’s application in courts, how economic hardship is treated under CISG, how arbitral awards have applied the substantive provisions of CISG, as well as CISG issues in setting aside applications before the Singapore courts.

The panelists are Prof. Gary F. Bell, Justice Franco Cortesi, Prof. Franco Ferrari, Dr. Friedrich Rosenfeld, Prof. Marco Torsello, and Mr. Alvin Yeo. The event will be moderated by Mr. Piyush Prasad. 

To attend, please submit the webinar registration information here.

On Tuesday, February 4^th, 2020 (from 6.00 – 8.00 pm, in the Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, Furman Hall 900, 245 Sullivan Street, New York, NY 10012), the Center for Transnational Litigation, Arbitration, and Commercial Law will host a conference on the occasion of which the book authored by Roman Khodykin & Carol Mulcahy, “A Guide to the IBA Rules on the Taking of Evidence”,  Consultant Editor Nicholas Fletcher QC (Oxford University Press, 2019) will be discussed.

It is a great pleasure to be able to announce that Dirk De Meulemeester and Friedrich Rosenfeld will comment on the aforementioned book and that the co-authors Carol Mulcahy and Roman Khodykin will be present and respond to the comments.

Carol Mulcahy is a partner in the International Arbitration department of law firm Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP. She has over 30 years of experience of dealing with commercial disputes in relation to a wide variety of transactions and industry sectors including disputes relating to joint ventures, energy projects, oil-trading, shareholder disputes and outsourcing agreements. Her arbitration practice includes proceedings under LCIA, SIAC, ICC and UNCITRAL rules, and with a variety of seats.  Carol is a Chartered Arbitrator and, in addition to her work as counsel, she sits as arbitrator in arbitrations conducted under the LCIA Rules. Carol also writes regularly for publications on a variety of topics related to international arbitration and other forms of dispute resolution. 

Roman Khodykin is a Partner at Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP, and a Visiting Professor at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies at Queen Mary University of London. Roman is a dual qualified solicitor of the Senior Courts of England and Wales and a Russian advocate. He holds a PhD in Conflict of Laws. Between 2015 and 2018 Roman was an alternate member for Russia of the ICC International Court of Arbitration. In recent years Roman has acted in ICSID, LCIA, ICC, AAA and MKAS arbitrations. Roman also represented athletes before the Ad Hoc Division of the Court of Arbitration for Sport. In addition to his work as counsel he has sat as an arbitrator under the LCIA, SCC and  ICC Rules.  Roman is ranked as one of Who’s Who Legal’s Future Leaders 2018 in International Arbitration.  He is also named as Lawyer of the Year for work in International Arbitration in The Best Lawyers™ in Russia.

Dirk De Meulemeester is a partner at DMDB Law, a boutique law firm in Brussels and President of the Belgian Center for Arbitration and Mediation (CEPANI). He is a professor at the University of Gent and a visiting professor at the University of Leiden. He is a member of the Bar of Brussels and Paris (till 2017). Practicing dispute resolution for over 20 years, in both national and international commercial arbitration. Acting as counsel or arbitrator (co-arbitrator, sole arbitrator or presiding arbitrator) in over sixty arbitration proceedings, administered (incl. ICC, Swiss Rules, ICSID, PCA, CEPANI, WIPO, NAI) and ad hoc, governed by various procedural and substantive laws, both civil law and common law, and by international law. Extensive experience in Mediation, Mini-Trial, MedArb. Areas of specialization include joint venture, share purchase, M&A, sales, agency, distribution, IT, construction, energy, the pharmaceutical sector and investment arbitration.

Friedrich Rosenfeld is a partner at the arbitration boutique Hanefeld in Hamburg, Germany. Apart from his work as counsel in international arbitrations, Friedrich frequently sits as arbitrator. He has acted as president, co-arbitrator and sole arbitrator in arbitrations seated in Austria, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Israel, Switzerland and the United States. During this coming semester, Friedrich will teach international commercial arbitration at NYU School of Law as Global Hauser Professor from Practice. He is also a Visiting Professor at the International Hellenic University in Thessaloniki and a Lecturer at Bucerius Law School in Hamburg. Friedrich has published in leading journals on international arbitration. Most recently, he has co-edited and authored the book entitled “Inherent Powers in International Arbitration” (Juris, 2019).

There is no need to register for the event. Seats will be assigned on a first-come-first-served basis.

The Chatham House rule applies.

The Center hosts, together with the International Centre for Dispute Resolution (ICDR) – the international branch of the American Arbitration Association (AAA), a conference on the “CISG in International Arbitration”. The CISG’s 40^th anniversary seems an appropriate occasion to analyze some issues which are still generating controversy, such as the CISG’s applicability in international arbitration, the battle of the forms, the remedies available in case of fundamental breach of contract, as well as whether the CISG covers economic hardship. The event will take place on February 3, 2020, at NYU School of Law’s Furman Hall, 245 Sullivan St., Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, 9^th floor, from 3:30-7:30 pm.

The event’s speakers are Prof. Kevin Davis (NYU), Prof. Clayton P. Gillette (NYU), Dr. Friedrich Rosenfeld (Visiting Professor, NYU), Prof. Marco Torsello (Verona University),  and Gretta Walters (Chaffetz Lindsey LLP, New York). The event will be moderated by Mr. Rafael Carmona (ICDR) and Prof. Franco Ferrari, the Center’s Director.

The Center is pleased to announce a seminar entitled “Micula vs Achmea = Investment Law vs EU Law?”. The event will take place on Wednesday, October 16, 2019, from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM, in the Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, Furman Hall 900 (245 Sullivan Street, New York, NY 10012).

It is a great pleasure to be able to announce that Ms. Nathalie Colin, Mr. Alexandre Hublet and Kevin D. Benish agreed to present their views on different aspects of the relationship between EU and Investment Law.

Nathalie Colin is a partner and the head of the Disputes practice of the Brussels office of White & Case. Nathalie has been a commercial litigator since 1994, and has extensive experience of cross-border and domestic litigation, arbitration and white collar/investigations. In the field of arbitration, Nathalie acts as counsel and arbitrator, and was recently appointed President of a CEPANI arbitral tribunal. Nathalie obtained a landmark decision from the Brussels Court of Appeal in 2016 in an important precedent for enforcement of foreign arbitral awards under Belgian law.  She regularly publishes articles and is a speaker at conferences on international arbitration matters. Since June 2019, she has been a member of the Board of Directors of the CEPANI.  Nathalie is currently working on the Belgian enforcement efforts in the Micula case.

Alexandre Hublet is an associate at the Brussels office of White & Case .We represents domestic and foreign clients in litigation, arbitration and white collar/investigations. Alexandre was recently appointed sole arbitrator by the CEPANI, and often acts as secretary of arbitral tribunals. Alexandre is a teaching assistant in international private law at the Université Libre de Bruxelles. He is a regular speaker at conferences and has also authored various publications on international arbitration. He holds an LLM degreed from NYU, where he specialized in international arbitration. He is admitted to the New York bar. Like Nathalie, Alexandre is currently working on the Belgian enforcement efforts in the Micula case

Kevin D. Benish is an associate at Holwell Shuster & Goldberg LLP, were he represents domestic and international clients in matters involving transnational litigation, arbitration, and matters of constitutional law. He is also an adjunct professor at the New York University School of Law, where he co teaches International Litigation and Arbitration with Professor Linda Silberman. As an experienced litigator, Kevin has advised clients on judgment- and award-enforcement matters under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act and the ICSID Convention, and is regularly involved in U.S. proceedings in aid of foreign litigation and arbitrations. In addition to his practice, Kevin is a frequent author and commentator on topics related to transnational litigation, civil procedure, conflict of laws, and comparative law. Recently, he was an External Scientific Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Procedural Law in Luxembourg.

Please note that the Chatham House rule applies.

The Center is pleased to announce a conference entitled “Due Process in International Arbitration.” The event will take place on Friday, October 18, 2019, from 8:30 AM to 6:15 PM, in the Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, Furman Hall 900 (245 Sullivan Street, New York, NY 10012).

This event will discuss the topics addressed in the national reports drafted on the basis of a questionnaire prepared by Professors Franco Ferrari, Dietmar Czernich, and Friedrich Rosenfeld. The ultimate goal behind the national reports and the discussion that will take place at the conference is to provide the background information for those involved in litigation as to the decision courts may take.

This is to announce this academic year’s first session of the Forum of the Center for Transnational Litigation, Arbitration, and Commercial Law, entitled “Facebook’s Libra in the context on international transactions and the CISG”. The event will take place on Monday, September 23rd, 6.00 – 8.00 pm, in the Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, Furman Hall 900 (245 Sullivan Street, New York, NY 10012).

It is a great pleasure to be able to announce that on the occasion of that session, Prof. Sebastian Omlor will give a talk on the aforementioned topic.

Sebastian Omlor, who holds an LL.M. degree from NYU, an s.j.d. and an LL.M. degree from Saarland University in Germany, is full professor and Director of the Institute for Comparative Law at Marburg University in Germany. At Marburg University, he holds the chair for private law, commercial and business law, banking law and comparative law. His research also focuses on banking and company law, the law of payment and financial services, the law of digitalisation, and the legal concept of money. As a legal expert, he advised, inter alia, the German parliament (Bundestag) and the German Federal Ministry of Finance.

The Center, together with Bucerius Law School and McGill University, will hold a conference entitled “Costs and damages in international arbitration”. The conference will address the most disparate issues, including how hermeneutics misshape reasoning and lead to increased costs, how to improve trust and transparency in arbitrator time reporting, and how costs are being allocated in international arbitration. The conference will take place on April 12, 2019, from 9.30 am to 4.30 pm, in the  Juridicum, Room U18, University of Vienna, Schottenbastei 10-16, 1010 Vienna. The event is graciously hosted by the University of Vienna just prior to the commencement of the 26th annual Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot. For the detailed program, please click here

This is to announce the October 2018 session of the Forum of the Center for Transnational Litigation, which will take place on Monday, October 29th, 2018, from 6.00 p.m. to 8.00 p.m., in the Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, Furman Hall 900 (245 Sullivan Street, New York, NY 10012). On the occasion of this session of the Forum, Professor Yeşim Atamer, a full professor of Civil Law and Comparative Civil Law at Istanbul Bilgi University, Turkey, will examine the requirements for a party not to be liable for failure to perform under CISG’s Article 79. NYU Professors Clayton Gillette and Franco Ferrari will comment on Professor Atamer’s presentation and will discuss whether the CISG addresses economic hardship, an issue that if one often to be addressed by arbitral tribunals charged with deciding disputes arising out of long-term sales agreements impacted by the financial crisis.

On 13 September 2018, the Center will host a conference entitled “The Application of the New York Convention in Latin America: Domestic versus International Standards” on the occasion of which practitioners and academics will discuss whether courts in Latin American have interpreted the New York Convention in light of domestic law or international standards. The speakers will discuss why the answer to the question is relevant in practice. For the full program, please click here.

The Center for Transnational Litigation, Arbitration, and Commercial Law will host a talk on Tuesday, February 14 from 6:00-8:00pm. Mr. Gary Born, current scholar-in-residence, will be presenting “BITs, BATs and Buts: International Dispute Resolution” in the Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, FH900.

The Center hosts, together with Sciences-Po, a seminar on “how do arbitrators decide” that is to take place on 30 May 2016, from 4.30-6.30 pm. The event’s main speaker will be Eduardo Silva Romero (Dechert Paris), while Prof. Fabien Gélinas (McGill University), Prof. Pierre Mayer (University Paris 1), Ms. Isabelle Michou (Herbert Smith Freehills Paris) and Prof. Franco Ferrari (the Center’s Director)  will act as commentators. The event will be moderated by Prof. Diego Arroyo (Sciences-Po). For more info, click here

This is to announce the February 2016 session of the Arbitration Forum of the Center for Transnational Litigation, Arbitration and Commercial Law, entitled “Arbitrator Power: The Transatlantic Divide”, which will take place on Monday, 29February 2016, from 6.00 – 8.00 pm, in the Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, Furman Hall 900 (245 Sullivan Street, New York, NY 10012).

It is a great pleasure to be able to announce that Professor Margaret Moses will give a talk on the aforementioned topic and that Dr. Monique Sasson and Mr. Christian Alberti agreed to act as commentators.

NYU’s  Center  for  Transnational  Litigation,  Arbitration  and  Commercial  Law  will  hold  its  Fifth  Annual Arbitration Practice Moot  on  Saturday,  27  February  2016  and  Sunday,  28  February  2016.    The  event  will  be  co-hosted  by  Hogan  Lovells US  LLP  and  NYU’s  International  Arbitration  Association.    The  principal  objective  of  the  NYU  Practice  Moot  is  to provide  a  forum  within  which  students  participating  in  this  year’s  Willem  C.  Vis  International  Commercial Arbitration  Moot  can  refine  their  oral  presentations  by  pleading  before,  and  receiving  constructive  feedback  from, panels of distinguished arbitrators.

For the program please click here.

This is to announce the November session of the Arbitration Forum of the Center for Transnational Litigation, Arbitration and Commercial Law, entitled “How Singapore became a successful arbitration centre using the UNCITRAL Model Arbitration Law,” which will take place on Monday, 23 November 2015, from 6.00 – 8.00 pm, in the Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, Furman Hall 900 (245 Sullivan Street, New York, NY 10012).

It is a great pleasure to be able to announce that Professor Gary F. Bell will give a talk on the aforementioned topic and that Ms. Alexandra Dosman agreed to act as commentator.

Associate Professor Gary F. Bell teaches arbitration, Indonesian law and the international sale of goods at the National University of Singapore where he was the founding director of the Asian Law Institute (ASLI). He has law degrees in both civil and common law from McGill, where he was the Editor-in-Chief of the McGill Law Journal.  He clerked for Justice Stevenson of the Supreme Court of Canada. He has an LL.M. from Columbia Law School.  He has acted as sole arbitrator, member of a panel or chair in numerous ICC and SIAC arbitrations. He presently works on a research project on the use of the UNCITRAL Model Arbitration Law in Asia.

Alexandra Dosman is the first Executive Director of the New York International Arbitration Center (“NYIAC”). Prior to joining NYIAC in May 2013, Ms. Dosman practiced commercial litigation and international arbitration at Shearman & Sterling LLP for seven years. She writes and speaks widely on commercial and investment treaty arbitration matters.

To RSVP (required), please send an email to: cassy.rodriguez@nyu.edu

The Center for Transnational Litigation, Arbitration and Commercial Law is pleased to announce that it will host a conference entitled, “Convergence or Divergence of EU and US Private International Law?”, which will take place on Monday, 26 October 2015, from 2:00 – 7:30.00 p.m., in the Lester Pollack Colloquium Room, Furman Hall 900 (245 Sullivan Street, New York, NY 10012).

Entries prepared for the European Encyclopedia of Private International Law will be used to look into whether the private international laws of the US and the EU are really as far apart as people generally believe them to be.

Our distinguished list of speakers include Jürgen Basedow, Samuel Baumgartner, George Bermann, Andrea Bonomi, Donald Childress, William Dodge, Tim Dornis, Franco Ferrari, Diego Fernandez Arroyo, Stéphanie Francq, Joseph Lookofsky, Ralf Michaels, Horatia Muir Watt, Luca Radicati di Brozolo, Francesca Ragno, Kermit Roosevelt, Linda Silberman and Louise Ellen Teitz.

For the conference program, click here.

To RSVP (required), please send an email to: cassy.rodriguez@nyu.edu by 21 October 2015.

The Center for Transnational Litigation, Arbitration and Commercial Law is pleased to announce that it will host a conference entitled “Limits to Party Autonomy in International Commercial Arbitration” on 17 and 18 September 2015. The list of speakers include Prof. George A. Bermann, Dr. Andrea Carlevaris, Prof. Giuditta Cordero-Moss, Prof. Kevin Davis, Prof. Filip De Ly, Prof. Diego Fernandez Arroyo, Dr. Inka Hanefeld, Prof. Helen Hershkoff, Mr. Brian King, Prof. Stefan Kröll, Prof. Luca Radicati di Brozolo, Dr. Francesca Ragno, Dr. Friedrich Rosenfeld, Prof. Maxi Scherer, Prof. Linda Silberman, Mr. Nathan Yaffe.

The event will start on Thursday, 17 September, at 3 pm. The event will take place at 245 Sullivan St., Furman Hall, Pollack Room, 10012 NY.

For the conference program click here

To RSVP (required), please send an email to: cassy.rodriguez@nyu.edu