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Contributions of the UNCITRAL Committee in the Context of International Trade

Contributions of the UNCITRAL Committee in the Context of International Trade

International trade exchange means achieving faster growth and higher standards of living and providing new opportunities through trade in general and international trade in particular. In order to increase these opportunities on a global scale, there must be a legal framework and international committees working to lay down modern, fair and harmonious foundations, laws and rules regarding commercial transactions

Specialized entities vary at the international level, to show us a special and essential party on the commercial level that has had and still has an important and essential role in the various fields of international trade, and this is the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law, a subsidiary entity of the United Nations General Assembly responsible for assisting in facilitating international trade and investment its mission is to modernize and harmonize the rules relating to international business, and is referred to by the acronym “UNCITRAL” United Nations Commission on International Trade Law .

The UNCITRAL Commission has played a large and multiple role in the field of international trade in general and in the field of commercial arbitration in particular through its arbitration legal preparations, the most important of which were the New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitration Provisions of 1958 as well as the UNCITRAL International Commercial Arbitration Act of 1976 as amended in 2010 Model Law on Commercial Arbitration 1985 revised 2006, UNCITRAL texts commenced, drafted and adopted by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law.

UNCITRAL carries out the mandate entrusted to it by General Assembly resolution 2205, paragraph 8:

  • Coordinating the work of organizations active in the field of international trade law, and encouraging cooperation between them.
  • Promote wider participation in existing international agreements, and wider acceptance of existing model and uniform laws.
  • Preparing international agreements, model laws and new unified laws or promoting their adoption, and promoting the codification of terms, provisions, norms and practices related to international trade and to broadening the scope of their acceptance, in cooperation with organizations working in this field when necessary.
  • Promoting ways and means that ensure the interpretation and uniform application of international agreements and uniform laws in the field of international trade law.
  • Collecting and disseminating information on national legislation and recent legal developments, including case law in the field of international trade law.
  • Establishing and maintaining close cooperation with the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.
  • Maintaining connections with the other United Nations bodies and specialized agencies concerned with international trade
  • Take any other measures that it may deem useful to perform its functions.
  • The United Nations Commission on International Trade Law as an Entity Defending the Interests of International Trade

UNCITRAL is not part of the World Trade Organization as it is a subsidiary body of the United Nations General Assembly. The UNCITRAL Secretariat is the International Trade Law Division of the Office of Legal Affairs of the United Nations Secretariat. The World Trade Organization “WTO” is an intergovernmental organization independent of the United Nations. The issues dealt with by the WTO and UNCITRAL are different. The Organization deals with trade policy issues, such as trade liberalization, the elimination of trade barriers, unfair trade practices, or similar issues usually relating to common law, while UNCITRAL deals with the laws applicable to private parties in international transactions. Hence, UNCITRAL does not address inter-state issues, such as anti-dumping, countervailing duties or import quotas.

The UNCITRAL Commission dealt with many topics and issued special model legislation for them, among the topics and works are:

  1. The International Sale of Goods and Related Transactions
  2. The United Nations Convention on the Limitation Period in the International Sale of Goods (New York 1974), which established uniform rules for regulating the time period during which legal procedures arising from contracts for international sale should begin. The Convention was amended by a protocol adopted in 1980 and the entry into force of the original and amended Convention on 1/8 /1988.
  3. The United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (Vienna 1980), which established a comprehensive code of legal rules regulating the formation of contracts for international sales and the obligations of the seller and buyer which entered in force on 1/1/1988
  4. The UNCITRAL Legal Guide on International Equivalent Trade Deals, which was adopted in 1992. The guide seeks to assist parties negotiating international trade deals and identifies the legal issues involved in those deals and discusses their possible contractual solutions.
  • International Transport of Goods
  • The United Nations Convention on the Maritime Transport of Goods (Hamburg Rules 1978), which established a unified legal system regulating the rights and obligations of shippers, carriers and consignees under the contract of carriage of goods by sea, and its entry into force on 1/11/1992.
  • The United Nations Convention on the Responsibility of Terminal Operators in International Trade, which established unified legal rules regulating the liability of terminal operators for the loss or damage of goods that occur in transportation and for the promised delay in delivery. The agreement was ratified on 19/4/1991.
  • International Commercial Arbitration and Conciliation
  • The UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules, which contain a comprehensive set of procedural rules that the parties may agree upon, are widely used in individual structured arbitration and were adopted in 1976.
  • Recommendations under the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules 1982.
  • The UNCITRAL Conciliation Rules 1980.
  • The UNCITRAL Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration (1985), which assists countries in reforming and updating their laws relating to arbitration procedures. And many countries have adopted it as the arbitration law in their own countries
  • UNCITRAL Notes on the Organization of Arbitral Proceedings 1996 to assist arbitration practitioners by providing an annotated list of issues on which an arbitral tribunal may wish to formulate decisions.
  • Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards
  • Procurement and Infrastructure Development
  • The UNCITRAL Model Law on the Procurement of Goods, Construction and Services 1994 assists States in reforming and modernizing their procurement laws and includes procedures to achieve the objectives of transparent competition and fairness
  • UNCITRAL Guide on Privately Financed Infrastructure Projects 2001 to assisting establish a legal framework for private sector investment in infrastructure and encourage its participation
  • Construction Contracts
  • UNCITRAL Legal Guide for the Drafting of International Contracts for the Construction of Industrial Facilities, February 1988.
  • International Payments
  • The United Nations Convention on International Bills of Exchange and International Promissory Notes (New York, 1988), which includes a comprehensive code of legal rules regulating international instruments, and was adopted on 12/1/1988.
  • UNCITRAL Legal Manual on Electronic Funds Transfers 1987.
  • UNCITRAL Model Law on International Credit Transfers 1992.
  • United Nations Conventions Relating to Independent Guarantees and Standalone Letters of Credit (New York 1995)
  • United Nations Convention on the Assignment of Receivables in International Trade 200
  • E-Commerce
  • Recommendations Concerning the Legal Value of Computer Records 1985.
  • UNCITRAL Model Law on Electronic Commerce.
  • UNCITRAL Model Law on Electronic Signatures 2001.
  • Insolvency & the Legal Nature of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law

The UNCITRAL Committee is a subsidiary legal body of the United Nations General Assembly, and the UNCITRAL Secretariat is the international commercial legal division of the Office of Legal Affairs of the United Nations Secretariat. The UNCITRAL Commission is a legal body with global membership specialized in commercial law reform on a global scale for more than 50 years. The mission of UNCITRAL is to modernize and harmonize the rules relating to international business. During the preparation of the arbitration legal rules and texts, the most important of which were the New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitration Awards of 1958, as well as the UNCITRAL International Commercial Arbitration Act of 1976, as amended in 2010, the Model Law of Commercial Arbitration in 1985, as amended in 2006.

Through the legal nature of the UNCITRAL Commission for the preparation of arbitration legal rules and texts, we find two terms and convergent arbitration rules that may be unclear in this field. Both were issued by one side, which is the UNCITRAL Committee. In establishing the Commission, the General Assembly recognized that disparities in national laws regulating international trade create obstacles to the flow of trade, and considered the Commission to be the means by which the United Nations could play a more active role in reducing and removing these obstacles. Accordingly, the Model Law issued in 1985 and amended in 2006 provides a pattern that national legislators in all countries of the world can adopt as part of their internal legislation on arbitration. This is what has already happened since the issuance of the first modern and advanced Arab arbitration law independent of the Civil Procedures Law, which is the Egyptian Arbitration Law No. 27 of 1994 in force after benefiting from the Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration, as well as the Jordanian Arbitration Law No. 31 of 2001 in force and other legislation arbitration in Arab countries. In simplified terms, the Model Law is directed at States and their legislators. As for the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules, they were adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1976 after extensive deliberations and consultations with many international organizations and experts in the field of arbitration, and those consultations were conducted under the auspices of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law called UNCITRAL. The UNCITRAL Rules were revised and revised in 2010 to reflect the evolution of arbitral practices. The rules were revised again in 2013 to add the UNCITRAL Rules on Transparency in Treaty-based Investor-State Arbitration.

On the other hand, the parties, whether they are individuals or countries, choose the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules in the arbitration agreement, to organize an arbitration process intended to settle a dispute or disputes between the parties. We find that the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules of 1976 are directed to the parties to the dispute. In order to know the difference and similarity between (the Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration) and (the UNCITRAL Rules for International Commercial Arbitration), we can extract them as follows:

A- Similar by:

  • Both of them aim at commercial arbitration and the settlement of various disputes.
  • Both issued by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law
  • Both of them aim at commercial arbitration and the settlement of various disputes.
  • Both issued by the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law

B- Differ in

  • The year of their issuance, the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules were issued in 1976 and were amended in 2010 and were also amended in 2013.
  • As for the Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration, it was issued in 1985 and its provisions were amended in 2006.
  • Through the party to which they are addressed. UNCITRAL rules address states and individuals to adopt its rules in settling commercial disputes, while the Model Law is a legal discourse directed to state legislators for adoption as a national law in its entirety or after amending some of its provisions in accordance with their national legal system.
  • The parties to any contract may agree to use the UNCITRAL Commercial Arbitration Rules of 1976 as amended to guide the settlement of disputes that arise between them. National Arbitration Legislation across borders.
  • UNCITRAL Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvency 1997
  1. UNCITRAL Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvency 1997
  1. Security Interests
  1. Concerned with Settlement of Online Disputes
  1. International Commercial Mediation
  1. Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises
  1. Other products of the work of UNCITRAL

Provisions on a global unit of account and the settlement of responsibilities in the international transport agreements 1982.

Unified Rules for Contractual Terms of Amount Due Agreed in Support of Non-Performance 1983.

For more details, contact

Ahmed Hankawi

a.hankawi@etihad-law.com