International Economic Law and Policy Blog

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Simon Lester

More on EU Investment Policy: The Commission's Thoughts on Investor-State

As mentioned in the last post, a European Commission policy paper and draft regulation on investment policy were on their way. They are now available here and here. Here's what the policy paper says about investor-state: (d) Enforcing investment commitments Ensuring the effective enforceability of investment provisions is

Coming Soon: An EU Investment Policy

The European Commission announces the following today: The European Commission today took the first step towards a comprehensive European international investment policy with two initiatives. A policy paper lays out how the new EU competence on foreign direct investment can be used to boost competitiveness and trade resulting in growth

Trade in Everything: Serbian Football (Soccer) Coaches

From Emmanuel at IPE Zone: Somewhat overlooked, however, was the role played by Ghana's Serbian coach Milovan Rajevac. When it comes to coaches plying their trade internationally, few compare to the Serbians' drive for adventure. There is something innately curious at work here, so much so that

The Aircraft Report: Debating the Role of International Law

From the Interim Review section of the Aircraft report: 6.20 According to the United States, the last sentence of paragraph 7.46 of the Interim Report may be read to suggest that the Panel is applying Article 28 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (VCLT) as

The Aircraft Report: Debating the Role of Precedent

This is from the Interim Review section of the Aircraft report: 6.26 The United States requests that the first sentence of paragraph 7.248 of the Interim Report be modified to remove any suggestion that reports of the Appellate Body are binding except with respect to resolving the particular

Speaking of Subsidies

This is from President Obama's weekly address: ... today, I’m announcing that the Department of Energy is awarding nearly $2 billion in conditional commitments to two solar companies. The first is Abengoa Solar, a company that has agreed to build one of the largest solar plants in the

Export Contingency and Intent

From the EC - Aircraft panel report: 7.648 Correctly interpreted, the legal standard set out in footnote 4 indicates that a subsidy may be found to be contingent in fact upon anticipated export performance, and therefore prohibited under Article 3.1(a), when there is evidence demonstrating the existence

Issues for Appeal in Aircraft

Here are the obvious ones I've seen so far in reading through the report. For the EU: The finding that certain launch aid/member State financing constitutes prohibited export subsidies (paras. 7.582-716). It would be nice for the EU to not have these subsidies classified as "

ACTA is about Sustainable Development

Well, sort of. This is from USTR: Participants stressed the importance of ACTA as an agreement that will establish an international framework for their efforts to more effectively combat the proliferation of counterfeiting and piracy, which undermines legitimate trade and the sustainable development of the world economy. I'm

A Few Points About the Aircraft Decision

Nothing that important, but a couple things of note. First, Boeing has provided a nice breakdown of the findings for each measure. We often do this in our DSC, but they've saved us the trouble. (I assume they got it right, but have not double-checked). Second, I'