Disputes for Belt and Road China set up “international courts”

Category: Road

Disputes among companies participating in Belt and Road transportation infrastructure work, China plans to set up an “international court” to to settle the disputes, according to Chinese media. The Global Time newspaper reported if Chinese companies step up investment and business in countries covered by Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative,they are facing more foreign-related lawsuits.

Belt and Road called “a brainchild of Xi”, referring to Xi Jinping, also known as The Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21st-century Maritime Silk Road, is a plan to build land and sea routes to and from China across Asia to Europe to facilitate trade. It was proposed Xi in 2013. The “New Silk Road” focuses mainly on railway and highway, automobile, infrastructure investment, construction materials, power grid and iron and steel.

Under the Belt and Road Initiative majority of the projects are outside China but many internal projects are part of the strategy to improve logistics for the movement of goods internationally. Projects include the proposed ShenZhong Link between Shenzhen and Zhongshan cities and the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao bridge tunnel complex, now under construction.

A two-day summit hosted by the the Chinese government last May in Beijing, attended by 1,500 delegates from 130 countries, including 29 heads of state and government. Vladimir Putin the Russian president and Rodrigo Duterte the Philippine president were among the attendees. However, according to a report in The Times newspaper in London, there were few European Union leaders or their representatives.

To dispel fears of undue Chinese influence The report of a so-called international court in China to settle disputes deriving from Belt and Road initiatives could be a way. The Global Report noted that a prosed Belt and Road dispute settlement mechanism “is aimed at protecting both Chinese and foreign parties’ legal rights and interests and creating a stable, fair, transparent business environment with rule of law”. The court would be based in Beijing and be comprised of three international commercial courts set up by the Supreme People’s Court in the cities of Xi’an, Shenzhen and Beijing.

Official data showed Chinese investment in 59 countries covered by the Belt and Road initiative totalled $14.4 billion in 2017, roughly the same as the previous year but down from the record $18.5 billion in 2015, according to The Global Report.