Act II – Request for Arbitration, Response, and Counterclaim and Arbitrator Appointment Issues - WAMR 2010 Vol. 4, No. 4-5
KLAUS REICHERT is a barrister practicing from Dublin and
Brick Court Chambers in London. He has served as
arbitrator and counsel in a large number of international
cases in many jurisdictions under the LCIA, ICC, ICDR,
UNCITRAL, LCIA-DIFC, ICSID and other rules in investment
treaty and commercial matters. He is a member of several
international bodies including the ITA Board of Reporters,
the ILA International Arbitration Committee, and the LCIA
European Users’ Council. He served as co-chair of the IBA
Litigation Committee in 2008-2009, and is currently participating in the
Experts’ Group for the Hague Conference on Private International Law project
for the development of principles for choice of law in international contracts.
He has acted as counsel before the Irish Courts on numerous cases concerning
complex commercial and private international law issues since 1992. He has
also appeared in the English Courts in relation to one of the landmark cases on
the New York Convention. He was the chair of the Host Committee for ICCA
2008 in Dublin marking the 50th Anniversary of the New York Convention.
Originally from World Arbitration And Mediation Review (WAMR)
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ACT II – REQUEST FOR ARBITRATION, RESPONSE, AND
COUNTERCLAIM AND ARBITRATOR APPOINTMENT ISSUES
INTRODUCTION TO ACT II
Klaus Reichert, Workshop Co-Chair
I just have a couple of words of introduction. First, maybe if I
speak really slowly that might garner people’s attention. Perhaps
not. Alright, ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Act II of our
workshop. First a few words of thanks, personal words of thanks
from me. My name is Klaus Reichert. I have had the honor of
being one of the co-chairs of the workshop this year and I would
like to thank first Lucy Reed and her predecessor David Caron for
honoring me by choosing me to be one of the workshop co-chairs.
I really hope that ghastly decision of theirs won’t be regretted by
them as the next hour and a bit unfolds. I would also like to thank
David Winn and his team at ITA for all their sterling work.
Conferences like this are not easy to put on and they are put on
with elegance and aplomb by the ITA. And also I would like to
thank my co-chairs Jean and Chris; it’s been a wonderful
experience for me and a privilege to get to know them and work
with them and now consider them as close friends.
Finally I want to single out one person who is responsible
more than most for what you will see and hear over the next hour
or so. It’s my scriptwriter, Noelle Berryman of Wilmer Hale and
an enormous debt of gratitude is owed by me and everybody for
the work she did over the last six months. (Applause)
Alright, I have bad news for you. I’m afraid Drill-BD and
TorGas did not really get on that well in the performance of their
contract. Things did not go well. There were delays and I’m
afraid milestones for the drilling operations were missed and
TorGas is under some degree of pressure from the Ministry, as
you might imagine. And, of course, Drill-BD says, “Well, it’s got
nothing really to do with us. There were delays on TorGas’ side.
They did all sorts of silly things in failing to complete in a timely
manner roads and drill sites and so on and so forth. So as you
would imagine, there is going to be a long and expensive dispute.
So the focus of Act II is how to get the arbitration underway and
what the best practices are. The parties have had their amicable