[Exclusive] China to Set Up International Commercial Courts in Beijing, Shenzhen, Xi’an
Guo Liqin
(Yicai Global) Jan. 29 — China hopes to bring in a new dispute resolution system for litigation, mediation and arbitration relating to its Belt and Road Initiative as companies from the country look to invest more overseas.
The Supreme People’s Court will set up three international commercial courts in separate cities, an anonymous source told Yicai Global. A court in Central China’s Xi’an will focus on serving the land-based Silk Road Economic Belt and one in the southern city of Shenzhen will prioritize the Maritime Silk Road. The third court, in Beijing, will act as a headquarters.
Chinese President Xi Jinping chaired the second meeting of the Central Leading Group for Comprehensively Deepening Reforms on Jan. 23, during which the group approved documents that outlined China’s opinions on dispute resolution mechanisms for the Belt and Road.
Often compared with the ancient Silk Road, the One Belt, One Road initiative was proposed by Xi in 2013. It is a grand 30- to 40-year plan for a vast infrastructure and trade route boasting a major network of railroads, highways, ports and pipelines embracing the continents of Asia, Europe and Africa.
Chinese firms went on an overseas investment spree in 2016, but regulators intervened to clamp down on “irrational” spending last year, leading Chinese investment abroad to dive 11 percent to USD671 billion. London-based professional services firm PricewaterhouseCoopers believes the country will make more external investments this year.
“Chinese companies will face growing international political risks and resistance as they increase investment abroad,” Liang Guoyong, economic affairs officer at the Investment and Enterprise Division of United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, told Yicai Global. “But investor-state dispute settlements will become a very favorable mechanism for China.”
The China Council for the Promotion of International Trade is also working with overseas industry and commerce groups to create new international dispute prevention and resolution organizations based on “cooperation and sharing.”
China unveiled its first Belt and Road mediation center on Jan. 7 in Qianhai, Shenzhen, as part of the Shenzhen Qianhai Cooperation Zone People’s Court. It provides diversified solutions to international commercial disputes.
The World Bank’s International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes elected nine Chinese experts as mediators and arbitrators last September. Among them was Zhang Yuejiao, who the World Bank’s president Jim Yong Kim nominated. He was the first Chinese judge appointed to the appellate body of the World Trade Organization.
