Simon Lester

From a speech by EU trade commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom: I'd like to talk about three benefits in particular but the theme of today's event is the precautionary principle, so let me say a few words about that first. * As a starting point, it's good

From the WTO: The DSB agreed with the Chairman’s proposal for appointment/reappointment of Appellate Body members. In particular, it agreed to launch a selection process for one position in the Appellate Body to replace Ms Yuejiao Zhang, whose second four-year term of office will expire on 31 May

From Politico: “I pushed very, very, very aggressively for that tobacco provision to be part of this,” Wyden told POLITICO about the carveout that protects tobacco control-related policies from being challenged in investor-state cases. “I have watched the tobacco companies over the years particularly focus on global markets where they

The Obama administration's rejection of the Keystone XL pipeline was controversial; opinions on TransCanada's NAFTA Chapter 11 claim vary. Now Donald Trump has weighed in. You can probably imagine the result. This is from the Toronto Star: Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump says he would reject

This is from a new paper by Gus Van Harten and Pavel Malysheuski: The sociological legitimacy of investment treaty arbitration, commonly known as investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS), appears to depend in part on an expectation that it benefits smaller businesses, not just large multinationals and the super wealthy. Proposed trade

This is a fascinating article on ISDS from CBC news, explaining the tension between the EU and U.S. positions on ISDS, and how Canada is caught in the middle: European Union officials quietly approached Justin Trudeau's new government last fall with a request to revisit the controversial

Here's the list of Americans on the recently updated indicative list of WTO panelists: BROWN-WEISS, Ms. Edith CONNELLY, Mr. Warren GANTZ, Mr. David A. GORDON, Mr. Michael Wallace HODGSON, Ms. Mélida KASSINGER, Mr. Theodore W. KHO, Mr. Stephen LAYTON, Mr. Duane LICHTENSTEIN, Ms. Cynthia Crawford McGINNIS, Mr. John

The conference formerly known as the BIICL WTO conference, and this year organized by BIICL, the IIEL, the Graduate Institute and SIEL, will be held in Geneva this year, on June 10-11. The call for papers is here. Here are the topics being covered: • 1. LEGAL INNOVATION IN TPP AND

She has three proposals: First, we must continue to work on outstanding Doha issues, particularly those issues that can only be solved by the WTO and not in bilateral or regional agreements. One such issue is subsidies. We cannot approach them in the same way that we have in the

This is from Congressman Sandy Levin's testimony to the ITC on the impact of the TPP on the U.S. economy: We all recognize that trade can be beneficial. The issue is not whether Members of Congress such as myself could pass an Econ 101 class, as President