at Russian
Institute
of Modern
Arbitration
at Russian
Institute
of Modern
Arbitration
The Russian Arbitration Center at the Russian Institute of Modern Arbitration wishes all of our arbitrators, friends, and partners a Happy New Year and a Merry Christmas! Undoubtedly, 2019 has been the year of many important and interesting events that would never have been successful without your support.
We are happy to notice the substantial increase of our caseload. . A detailed report will be released in early 2020. Moreover, in 2019, the RAC created the Rules on Resolution of Agricultural Disputes (as amended on 21 January 2019) and the Ad Hoc Arbitration Rules (as amended on 8 October 2019).
The RAC has continued to work on the development and promotion of independent and professional arbitration in Russia and globally. On 25 March 2019, the RAC supported the V Russian Arbitration Day (RAD), one of the most successful arbitration-related conferences in Russia. For the first time, in 2019 the RAD received an award for the best publication on arbitration. The first person to receive the RAD Award was Alexander Vladimirovich Grebelsky, Ph.D., Assistant Professor at the S.N. Lebedev Department of International Private and Civil Law of the MGIMO University for his research paper on “Evidence in International Commercial Arbitration”.
On 5 to 10 August 2019, the RAC organized the Summer Academy on “International Arbitration in Russia and the CIS” – the first educational project in Russia of this kind. The Academy allowed its participants to attend unique courses taught by 32 professionals in ADR, who spoke on various topics in the fields of international commercial and investment arbitration, mediation, interaction between arbitral tribunals and courts, etc. The RAC selected 20 best applications out of 74 submitted by practitioners in the spheres of arbitration, mediation and litigation.
On 18 and 19 October 2019, together with the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (CIArb), the RAC held an introductory course “Introduction to International Commercial Arbitration” and an advanced course “Module 1. Law Practice & Procedure of International Arbitration”.
An important area of our work is to make arbitration more popular among students and young practitioners. Thus, in 2019, the RAC held the 3rd Russian Corporate Arbitration Moot Court Competition named after Professor V.P. Mozolin. In 2019, 87 teams (342 participants) registered for the Competition, from Vladivostok, Tomsk, Ufa, Orenburg, Perm, Yekaterinburg, Rostov-on-Don, Barnaul, Pskov, Saint Petersburg, Kazan, Vladimir, Tver, Krasnodar, Grozny, and Moscow.
Moreover, the RAC supported the 2019 Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot, as well as the Foreign Direct Investment International Arbitration Moot (FDI) and the Frankfurt Investment Arbitration Moot Court (FIAMC).
Throughout the year, the RAC was also active in holding arbitration-related events across many regions of Russia.
On 15 February 2019, we were the general partner of the 2nd Conference on Arbitration held as part of the XVI International Research-to-Practice Conference Kovalev Readings in Yekaterinburg.
On 9 September 2019, the RAC held a workshop on “The Practical Aspects of Resolution of Disputes by Arbitration” in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy.
On 31 May 2019, the RAC team organized a lecture for Russian students of the Far Eastern University Institute of Law (Vladivostok) on “The Legal Profession and Dispute Resolution in Japan and Russia”, featuring Kie Matsushima (Associate, Anderson Mori & Tomotsune) as the expert from Japan.
On 31 October 2019, the Sakhalin State University, the Japan Association of Arbitrators (JAA) and the RAC jointly held the Conference on “International Commercial Arbitration in Russia and Japan: National Practice and Development Prospects”. The event took the form of a moot arbitration for students of the Sakhalin State University and students from Japan.
One of the key areas of our work this year has been development of international cooperation between arbitral institutions. At the IX St. Petersburg Legal Forum, the RAC held a discussion on “The Current State and Future of Arbitral Institutions: from Competition to Cooperation?” that addressed the role of arbitral institutions in the promotion and development of international commercial arbitration. The discussion involved the representatives of ten prominent arbitral institutions: RAC, ICAC at the CCI of Russia, HKIAC, VIAC, SIAC, SCC, LCIA, DIS, SCAI, and CIETAC. At the Forum, the RAC also helped arrange a lecture on “The Art of Arbitration – a Cooperative Venture” by Neil Trevor Kaplan, QC (1984), JP (1984), CBE (2001), SBS (2007), an independent arbitrator and one of the founders of the HKIAC. We also congratulate our colleagues at the HKIAC and VIAС on receiving the authorization for administering arbitration in Russia this year.
In August 2019, the RAC became the first Russian arbitral institution that received the Observer Status with the UNCITRAL Working Group II “Arbitration and Conciliation/Dispute Resolution”. The issues on the agenda of the UNCITRAL Working Group II include expedited arbitration and areas for its potential improvement.
Finally, in September 2018, LF Academy and the RAC launched a series of interviews as part of our “Modern Arbitration LIVE” project. In 2019, we interviewed Joe Liu, the HKIAC Deputy Secretary-General, and Andrey Panov, Counsel with Allen & Overy.
These and many other events would not have been possible without the support you gave us in 2019.
The RAC sincerely wishes you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Our team wishes you and your family good health, an even more fruitful year, new successes and bold ideas!
