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PP RUEHRN
DE RUEHUNV #0533/01 2741326
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 301326Z SEP 08
FM USMISSION UNVIE VIENNA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 8481
RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK 1349
RUEHBS/USEU BRUSSELS
RUEHRN/USMISSION UN ROME 0052
INFO RUEHVI/AMEMBASSY VIENNA 1244
RUEHXX/GENEVA IO MISSIONS COLLECTIVE
RUEHFR/AMEMBASSY PARIS 0870

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 UNVIE VIENNA 000533 
 
DEPT FOR IO/T, EB/IFT/ODF AND L/PIL 
EMBASSIES FOR ECON/POL 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ABUD AORC EAID EINV ETRD KCRM KUNR UNCITRAL AU UN
SUBJECT: WORKING GROUP REFORMS UNICTRAL MODEL ARBITRATION LAW 
 
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SUMMARY 
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¶1.  (U) The United Nations Commission on International Trade Law 
(UNCITRAL) Working Group II on Arbitration met September 15-19, 2008 
in Vienna to continue discussing proposed reforms to the UNCITRAL 
model arbitration law.  The UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules are 
considered one of the most successful UNCITRAL texts, having been 
adopted by many arbitration centers and used in many different 
instances, for example in investor-State disputes.  At its fortieth 
session, in 2007, the Commission noted that the UNCITRAL Arbitration 
Rules had not been amended since their adoption in 1976 and the 
Rules should be modernized to promote greater efficiency in arbitral 
proceedings, without altering the original structure and spirit of 
the text.  The Commission expressed the hope, at its forty-first 
session in 2008, that the Working Group would complete the second 
reading of its revisions to the UNCITRAL rules and that the revised 
rules would be adopted at the forty-second session of the Commission 
in July 2009.  The Commission also agreed at its last session that 
the issue of transparency in investor state dispute resolution as a 
desirable objective was a separate topic that should be considered 
as a matter of priority after the adoption of the generic revisions 
of the UNCITRAL rules.  [Note: Further information on this 
initiative is available through the UNCITRAL website, at 
http://www.uncitral.org.]  The U.S. delegation was led by Michael 
Dennis from L/PIL. 
 
 
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Role of Permanent Court of Arbitration 
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¶2.  (U) A key issue that arose during the Working Group session was 
whether to expand the role of the Permanent Court of Arbitration 
(PCA) in arbitrations conducted under the UNCITRAL Rules.  Under 
Articles 6 & 7 of the existing Rules, when any party fails to 
appoint -- or the parties cannot agree upon appointment of -- an 
arbitrator, this role is to be performed by an appointing authority, 
which may be a person or institution chosen for this role by the 
parties.  If the parties cannot agree on an appointing authority, 
any party may ask the Secretary-General of the PCA to designate one. 
 It has been said that this two-step procedure of having the PCA 
designate an appointing authority that, in turn, appoints one or 
more arbitrators is inefficient.  Accordingly, at the Working 
Session in February 2007, it was proposed that the Rules should 
officially designate the Secretary-General of the PCA as the default 
appointing authority in any arbitration under the Rules in which the 
parties did not otherwise choose an appointing authority.  There was 
broad opposition to that proposal at the time, including by the U.S. 
delegation, on several grounds.  It was objected, inter alia, that 
the UNCITRAL Rules were meant to be international in scope and this 
was not compatible with designation of one institution in Europe to 
be responsible for appointing arbitrators from every region in the 
world, that the PCA did not have detailed knowledge of arbitrators 
in every region (especially inasmuch as the Secretary-General is by 
tradition a Dutch diplomat with no particular expertise in 
arbitration), and that the delays in the current two-step process 
had been minimized by increasing efficiency in the PCA's performance 
of its designation role. 
 
¶3.  (U) A number of delegations remain dissatisfied with that result 
and sought to revisit the issue during this Working Group session, 
arguing that the previous debate had been cut short by time 
constraints when discussion of a compromise approach was still under 
way.  In the debate during the current session, the U.S. opposed 
reopening this issue, given that the record of the Working Group's 
prior discussion was far more extensive than some delegates admitted 
and because the severe time pressures on the Working Group to 
complete its revision work by the end of the next Working Group 
session in early 2009 left little time for reconsideration of issues 
that had been resolved.  However, several delegations stated that 
they had reassessed their former opposition to expanding the role of 
the PCA, and thus the session concluded with an understanding that, 
time permitting, the issue could be re-examined at the next Working 
Group meeting, once the second reading of the Rules had been 
completed. 
 
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Discretion of Appointing Authority to Appoint Substitute Arbitrator 
or Establish Truncated Tribunal 
---------------- 
¶4. (U). Another unresolved issue concerns the discretion of the 
appointing authority to appoint substitute arbitrators or establish 
 
UNVIE VIEN 00000533  002 OF 002 
 
 
a truncated tribunal.  Some support was expressed for adopting a 
generic approach granting the appointing authority broad discretion 
in its decision whether to proceed itself with the replacement of 
the arbitrator, or order a truncated tribunal subject to 
clarification that such discretion would only exist in exceptional 
circumstances.  The prevailing view (generally supported by the 
USDEL), however, was that a provision allowing an appointing 
authority to proceed with the direct appointment of an arbitrator 
should not extend beyond the cases of improper conduct and should 
remain generic so as to cover all possible instances.  It was 
further agreed (again with the general support of the USDEL) that a 
provision allowing the appointing authority to opt for a truncated 
tribunal should include sufficient limitations so as to ensure that 
it might only happen in exceptional circumstances, and taking 
account of the stage of the proceedings. 
¶5.  (U).  After extended debate, a number of states suggested that 
the new rule might read: 
"If, on the application of a party, the appointing authority 
determines that the need for replacement of an arbitrator was caused 
by improper conduct in circumstances that justify a party's not 
having the right to appoint the substitute arbitrator, then the 
appointing authority may, after giving an opportunity to the 
parties, the arbitrators, and the arbitrator being replaced to 
express their views: (a) proceed itself to make the appointment of 
the substitute arbitrator; or (b) if the same occurs at the late 
stage of the proceedings, authorize the other arbitrators to proceed 
with the arbitration and make any decision or award." 
The proposal received broad support, but delegations continued to 
propose changes to the text.  For example, some argued that the 
general reference to improper conduct did not clarify whose conduct 
was at stake (i.e. the arbitrators only or the parties as well). 
Other delegations suggested that a general reference to "exceptional 
circumstances" should be added to better qualify the conditions 
under which the sanctions might be triggered.  It was also stated 
that the notion of a "late stage in the proceedings" was ambiguous 
for establishing a truncated tribunal and should be replaced with 
"closure of the proceedings," consistent with a parallel provision 
in the International Chamber of Commerce Arbitration rules. 
¶6.  (U). At the close of the debate, the Working Group requested 
that the Secretariat provide a revised draft of the proposal for 
consideration at a later stage. 
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Future Work 
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¶7.  (U) The next session of the Working Group will be held February 
8-13 in New York.  The Working Group will continue with its second 
reading of the generic revisions to the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules. 
However, it is not clear that the Working Group will complete the 
second reading of the revisions at the next working group session, 
given the substantial amount of work that remains.  Accordingly, it 
is unclear whether the Commission will be in a position to adopt the 
revisions to the Rules at its forty-second session. 
 
SCHULTE