 Home |
Syllabus |
Assignments/Readings |
Documents |
Exam Archive |
Glossary |
Links |
CLASS 25:
Investment Dispute Resolution -- The Loewen Case
On June 26, 2003, the NAFTA tribunal dismissed the claims against the United States in their entirety on jurisdictional grounds. Following the Mississippi state judgment, Loewen went through bankruptcy proceedings and, in its reorganized form, became a United States company. Since it was no longer a Canadian company, the tribunal held that Loewen no longer could bring a claim against the United States. In dicta, the tribunal said that, even if it had had jurisdiction, it would have found against Loewen on the grounds that Loewen could have appealed the Mississippi court judgment in the US federal courts and therefore the United States court system as a whole had not denied justice to Loewen.
The final decision in the Loewen case is now available on the State Department web site.