On 30 December 2020, the European Union and China announced their Agreement in Principle for the EU-China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI). This is a landmark development for both parties in these long-running negotiations which began in 2012. On 22 January 2021, in the interest of transparency, Brussels published certain draft sections (here) of the … Read more

In an award dated 9 March 2017, the Tribunal in an ICSID arbitration between Korean investor Ansung Housing Co., Ltd and China dismissed all claims as time-barred. The Claimant's attempt to circumvent the limitation period by relying on the most favoured nation (MFN) clause did not succeed. The Tribunal came to this conclusion at an … Read more

In the recent case of HKSAR v Pang Hung Fai (FACC 8/2013), the Court of Final Appeal (the CFA) offered, for the first time, authoritative guidance on the mental element of “having reasonable grounds to believe” under section 25(1) of the Organized and Serious Crimes Ordinance (Cap 455) (the OSCO).  Read more

At a ceremony in Beijing on 4 January 2015, representatives of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) and the Central Government of the People’s Republic of China signed a Host Country Agreement and a related Memorandum of Administrative Arrangements to provide facilities and support services in Hong Kong for PCA-administered dispute resolution proceedings. The Government … Read more

On 17 November 2014, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott announced that Australia and China had concluded a free trade agreement that has been under negotiation since April 2005. The agreement will now be prepared in both English and Chinese for signature by the parties, after which the agreement will go … Read more

This week, a South Korean property developer (“Ansung”)  became the second ever investor to request ICSID arbitration against the People’s Republic of China (“PRC”) (Ansung Housing Co., Ltd. v. People’s Republic of China (ICSID Case No. ARB/14/25)).  Little is known about the claims, which are reported to arise from the alleged actions of the provincial … Read more

The last few weeks have seen anti-Japanese protests in almost a dozen Chinese cities.  Demonstrators took to the streets apparently in response to the latest developments in a long-standing dispute between China and Japan concerning a group of islands in the East China Sea called Senkaku in Japan, Diaoyu in the People’s Republic of China … Read more

On 9 August 2012, after two years of negotiation, Mainland Chinese and Taiwanese negotiators signed the Cross-strait Bilateral Investment Protection and Promotion Agreement (“IPA“).  The IPA is expected to promote cross-strait economic exchanges, and to attract more Mainland Chinese investors into Taiwan and vice-versa.  Given the sensitivity of cross-strait relations (China does not recognise Taiwan … Read more