Jurisdiction: bilateral investment treaties

In The Republic of Korea v Dayyani and Others [2019] EWHC 3580 (Comm) the High Court has again considered the terms of a bilateral investment treaty, this time by reason of an appeal under section 67 of the Arbitration Act 1996 against the jurisdiction of the tribunal.

The jurisdictional questions were: whether the arbitration creditor had made an “investment” so as to trigger the arbitration clause; whether the arbitration creditor was an “investor”; and whether the tribunal’s ruling that the alleged breach of the investment contract was the responsibility of the state was a matter going to jurisdiction at all.