Emma Van Campenhoudt, Director Secretary General CEPANI
From 3-7 February 2025, Working Group II (WG II) of UNCITRAL met in New York to discuss key issues surrounding the recognition and enforcement of arbitral awards in electronic form. Following the previous meeting in Vienna, the UNCITRAL Secretariat had drafted a working paper, which can be consulted here. CEPANI took up its role as observer, and was represented by its president Benoît Kohl, Secretary-General Emma Van Campenhoudt and board members Dirk Demeulemeester, Vanessa Foncke and Maarten Draye. Moreover, as Belgium has been at the forefront of this issue since the 2024 modification of the law introducing the possibility to render and enforce arbitral awards in electronic form, CEPANI submitted responses to the UNCITRAL Secretariat’s questions in writing in advance.
Here are some of the main takeaways from the meeting:
During the discussions, there was broad consensus that next steps to facilitate the enforcement of arbitral awards rendered in electronic form should be explored. At the outset, there was some confusion about terminology, with the need to distinguish between an electronic version of an arbitral award issued on paper (e.g. a PDF scan of a paper copy), and an award issued solely in electronic form (e.g. an award issued in PDF-format, with affixation of a scanned or qualified signature). Further, some delegations expressed a general reluctance toward modifying the existing framework, urging for caution.
Regarding the New York Convention (NYC), there was a general consensus that no amendments to the Convention itself are necessary, though the form of any potential new instrument remained undecided. The decision to not alter the NYC, however, also limits the scope of possible action by WGII. In this connection, even though there are important differences with the situation today, the 2006 recommendation regarding the interpretation of Article II NYC was acknowledged as a useful inspiration. While there was further an openness to drawing from other UNCITRAL instruments relating to electronic documents as suggested by the UNCITRAL Secretariat, not all of these provisions were considered apposite for arbitral awards. At the same time, the Working Group was mindful that any deviations in wording from these instruments needed to be approached with caution. While no final text was approved, discussions leaned toward reducing the length of the text proposed by the UNCITRAL Secretariat.
For the Model Law (ML), it was agreed that any changes should be presented as clarifications rather than substantive modifications, to avoid suggesting that electronic awards are currently unenforceable.
Key Proposal and Next Steps
On Thursday, the delegations of Bahrain, Switzerland, and Mexico presented a proposal addressing how the New York Convention should be interpreted regarding electronic arbitral awards. While some concerns were raised — particularly about Article 31 of the 1969 Vienna Convention — the proposal was generally well received.
The essence of the recommendation is:
“Recommends that the New York Convention be interpreted in a way that arbitral awards rendered electronically are not excluded as constituting an ‘original’ under Article IV(1)(a).”
This proposal will now be taken to Vienna for further deliberation.
Friday’s session focused on approving the meeting report. However, discussions were prolonged due to numerous interventions from delegations.
Stay tuned for further updates from Vienna!