On 19 January 2017 Russian Constitutional Court considered it impossible to fulfill the decision of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) from July 31 2014, as it “contradicts the Constitution of the Russian Federation”: in other words, the court allowed the Russian authorities not to pay €1.9 billion to former shareholders of Yukos. In its 14 July 2015 decision the Court came to the conclusion that Russia may not enforce decisions under European Convention on Human Rights if they contradict the Constitution of the Russian Federation.

In 2014 the ECHR ordered Russia to pay former shareholders of Yukos compensation in the amount of €1.9 billion for the alleged violation of their rights to protection and a fair trial. Later, the Ministry of Justice sent a request to the Constitutional Court whether such payments can be made.

This case might have far-reaching consequences and right now it establishes a sort of precedent for the further non-compliance with some decisions of the ECHR. It resulted in the situation when Russia, in particular cases, may refuse to enforce ECHR’s decisions stating that they are contrary to provisions of the Constitution of the Russian Federation.

On 19.12.2016, Federal Law №. 453-F3, “Federal Law on amendments to the Arbitrazh Procedure Code of the Russia Federation” was signed by the President Putin.

Among reasons arbitrazh courts can refuse to try cases is lack of jurisdiction, if the case has already been tried and awarded, or if the case is being heard in another court. Before, commercial state courts could only end hearings after accepting cases. Now, the process is expedited. Under the new rules, the court decision and other documents will be sent to the applicant not later than five days from the date the claim is received by the court.

The new law brings the Arbitrazh Procedure Code in line with other procedural codes: Code of Civil Procedure of the Russian Federation and the CAS of the Russian Federation CAS. Courts of general jurisdiction could previously refuse cases. If a case is rejected, the rejection can be appealed to a higher court. If the case is rejected, the claim is recorded as submitted on the day the initial request was made to the court.

 Permanent arbitration institutions.

One of the most significant changes of Arbitration Law aimed to prevent creation of “pocket arbitrations” is mandatory licensing of permanent arbitration institutions in order to operate at the territory of Russia (not applied for two well-known arbitral institutions in Russia-International Commercial Arbitration Court and Maritime Arbitration Commission at the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Russian Federation).

The right to operate as permanent arbitration institution will be granted by the act of the Russian Government under recommendation of the Arbitration Development Council under the Russian Ministry of Justice basing on such criteria as specified list of arbitrators, reputation, range and kind of non-commercial organization’s activity etc.

Ad hoc arbitrations.

The authority of ad hoc arbitration is limited. First of all the corporate disputes cannot be subject to ad hoc proceedings. Another important revision is that parties to ad hoc arbitration lose their right to waive the right for the setting aside of an arbitral award, it could be disputed in the state court in any case.

Foreign arbitration institutions.

Foreign arbitration institution may administer the arbitration seated in Russia must obtain the consent of the Russian Government and for administering majority of corporate disputes to publish the special rules for corporate disputes.

In the absence of such consent the decisions of foreign arbitration institution will be considered as decisions of the ad hoc arbitration (with all abovementioned disadvantages).

This November I participated as an arbitrator in the ICC Lex Mercatoria International Moot Competition. The teams were to resolve the mock case prepared by the International Court of Arbitration on the basis of the Rules of Arbitration of the ICC. The venue of ICC Lex Mercatoria was kindly provided by the Belarusian State University. This is the first year of launchin the English Chapter of the Competition. The mock case was based on a real scenario, when a luxury yacht was severely damaged due to the alleged defect in the door locking mechanism. The material problem was focused on relations between the letter of credit (L/C) and the underlying contract, bank's obligations to pay under the L/C in case of the alleged forgery of signature. Procedural issue was arisen from a possibility of extending the ICC arbitration clause in the main contract to the bank by making reference in the L/C, as well as relations between the two arbitrations arising out of the same set of facts, but between different entities.

On 14 and 15 March 2015 I participated as an arbitrator at the 6th Willem C. Vis Moscow Pre-moot which was hosted by the Lomonosov Moscow State University. This year’s moot case involved the issues of jurisdiction over a non-signatory to an arbitration agreement and emergency arbitration (the proceedings were governed by the ICC Rules), as well as the problem of avoidance for fundamental breach in commodity sales under the CISG. The participating teams included Russian teams, and teams from the Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz team (Austria) and Ankara team (Turkey). It is therefore a unique opportunity for any interested lawyer or a law student to interact with other people sharing the same interests and working in the field of dispute resolution and commercial law.

I was invited to arbitrate a couple of sessions at the 7th Moscow Pre-moot to the 23rd Willem C. Vis Moot. Moscow (Moscow Pre-moot), and I was glad to participate in it again. This year the event has gathered 18 teams from Brazil, Germany, Switzerland, Netherlands, Czech Republic, Serbia, CIS, including of course from Russia. It was very useful training sessions for all teams before going to the world’s leading moot competition on private law and arbitration – Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot held annually in Vienna. Current moot proceedings are governed by the VIAC Rules and, in particular, the issues of recovery of damages (lost profits, disgorgement of profits, legal fees) and document production are in focus.

This year the first topic of the conference was "Winning and Losing in The Court of Public Opinion: Lawyers, Business Disputes, and the Media From a Global Perspective'. The panel managed to launch very interesting discussion and visitors of the conference could understand better approaches of lawyers to mass media from US perspective, UK and Russia.

The next session I took part was an interactive discussion 'Russia’s “pivot” to Asia'. Joe Liu from the Hong Kong International Arbitration and Noradele Radjai from Lalive law firm informed us on what Russian lawyers need to know about Hong Kong as arbitral seat.

The 3rd session was 'Arbitration of Commodity Disputes’. International arbitration is increasingly a preferred forum for resolving commodity disputes as it can be adapted to the particular needs of professionals in this field, who aim at resolving disputes in line with their way of conducting business: simply, fast and in a cost-efficient manner Since Russia is one of the major players on the commodity market, in particular with regard to raw materials, the topic became of high interest and importance to Russian lawyers.

The session with the following topic ‘Choice of Forum: Where and How?’ was visited by many Russian and UK trial lawyers since that roundtable examined the pros and cons of UK, US and Russia as jurisdictions to litigate and how the enforcement of a potential judgment affects the choice of forum.

During the closing plenary session, the audience was engaged in an interactive discussion about some of the most recent developments in Russian and CIS-related litigation and arbitration, with a focus on the most critical questions that emerge during the course of the day’s panels and other topical issues. I also took my chance to share my views on, and experiences of, current “hot topics”.

Alexander Muranov from Muranov, Chernyakov & Partners presented his outline of the new package of arbitration laws in Russia, its rationale and intended effects.

Andrey Gorlenko, Executive Administrator from the Arbitration Center at the Institute of Modern Arbitration presented discussed the role that the new arbitration institutions which are expected to play an important role in adjudicating disputes after Sep 1, 2016 and shared his experiences in setting up the Arbitration Center.

Jon Hines from Morgan Lewis law firm discussed the impact of Russia's new arbitration law reform package on oil and gas dispute resolution in Russia.

On July 4, 2016 the President Putin signed Federal Law from 03.07.2016 #343-FZ "On Amendments to the Federal Law 'On Joint Stock Companies' and Federal Law 'On Limited Liability Companies' in the regulation of large transactions and transactions in which there is an interest."

The notion of "large transaction" (Article 78 of the Federal Law on Joint Stock Companies and Article 46 of the Federal Law On LLCs) now also includes transfers of property for temporary possession and/or use, providing third parties the right to use the result of an intellectual activity or means of individualization on the terms of the license, if their carrying amount is 25 percent of the book value of the company's assets.

The notion of "related party transaction" (Article 81 of the Federal Law on Joint Stock Companies and Article 45 of the Federal Law LLCs). Such a transaction is recognized in an interested member of the Board of Directors (Supervisory Board), the sole executive body, members of the collegial executive body of the company or person who is the controlling person of the company or the person entitled to give binding instructions to the public for him.

The decision to approve a major transaction will be called "the consent of the commission, or on the subsequent approval.