Publicat pe 17/05/2017

The Court of International Commercial Arbitration attached to the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Romania (CCIR) launched for public debate the new Draft Rules of Arbitration, whose main objective was to reconfigure the commercial arbitration in Romania harmonized with the needs of business environment, legal professionals and in line with best European and international practices in the field.

“Romania’s economic development needs arbitration, as a fast and efficient way to settle disputes between traders”, Mihai Daraban, president of CCIR said at a conference on commercial arbitration.

The ingredients of an effective commercial arbitration are: business environment confidence in arbitration, stable and efficient procedures, professional upstanding arbitrators and, implicitly, quality arbitration awards. These are the premises the New Draft Rules of Arbitration are based on, grounded on the following principles:

  • the principle of procedural autonomy for parties and arbitrators – the possibility of adopting any procedure deemed appropriate pursuant to the specificity of the case, even if it is different from the procedure followed by the courts of law or the one established by the rules of arbitration, as long as it does not breach the right to defense, the rule of law or the imperative norms of law;
  • introducing a clear boundary between the written phase and the oral phase of the arbitration process, emphasizing the importance of  written phase;
  • the Arbitral Tribunal improving case settlement by setting specific requirement for a complete procedural timetable on the actions to be fulfilled in the case;
  • establishing a regulation for multi-party arbitration (one of the most internationally debated issues and difficult to resolve in terms of observing all interests involved);
  • facilitating the administration of evidence, particularly in the case of witness evidence and expert reports, which in current practice may cause long delays in the file;
  • regulating a simplified procedure, which will be applicable to low-value cases (up to 50,000 lei) and when the parties agree to do so;
  • introducing the institution of emergency arbitrator, who will be able to adopt provisional and precautionary measures even before the constitution of the Arbitral Tribunal;
  • making members of the Arbitral Tribunal more responsible by eliminating alternate arbitrator’s institution and strengthening the role of the presiding arbitrator in  administering the proceedings;
  • encouraging arbitrators to use techniques in order to make arbitration procedures more efficient, such techniques are enumerated by way of example and enclosed to the rules, in order to reduce the duration of the procedure and all related costs;
  • diminishing the difference in treatment between international and domestic arbitration, which, given the conditions of Romania’s integration into the European Union and the existence of unique economic space of the latter, has become to a great extent superfluous.

When drafting the project, there were considered, in addition to the applicable legal provisions of the new Civil and Civil Procedure Codes, both the regulations of the main arbitration institutions in the European Union and the Arbitration Rules of United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL), as well as the most prestigious doctrinal opinions in Romania and in the field of international arbitration.

“Romania needs important benchmarks and the expertise of countries with strong commercial arbitrage systems, which remain an effective alternative way of settling commercial disputes because it implies celerity, efficiency and represents an important anchor for the economic environment,” said Ștefan Deaconu, President of the International Court of Commercial Arbitration attached to CCIR.

The new Draft Arbitration Rules will be subject to adoption in the autumn of 2017 and will take effect staring 1st of January 2018.

In this respect, there are invited to submit proposals for amendments or suggestions both representatives of private companies, as well as practitioners, so that through a sustained effort the new package of arbitration rules translates into a simple, supple and efficient tool for commercial disputes settlement.

Suggestions and comments on the Draft Rules of Arbitration will be sent to: arbitration@ccir.ro by 15th of July 2017 at the latest.