ICCA Hosts a New York Convention Roadshow for the Colombian Council of State

Report written by Emilie de Haas  

On 28 July 2021, ICCA held the first in a series of webinars tailored for Latin American judiciaries. The event was specially conceived for the judiciary of the Colombian Council of State (Consejo de Estado) and was held in Spanish. Building on the success of previous virtual Roadshows held in the last year in several African jurisdictions (Ghana, Rwanda, Cameroon and Tanzania), ICCA also hosted this Roadshow in webinar format. The event was led by ICCA Governing Board Members Mr. Andrés Jana, Partner at Bofill Mir & Alvarez Jana in Chile and Professor Eduardo Zuleta of Zuleta Abogados & Asociados in Colombia. In attendance were eleven judges of the Council of State, the highest court for administrative matters in Colombia. The Council of State is competent to decide on setting aside and enforcement proceedings for arbitral awards involving a Colombian public entity.

The webinar consisted of presentations by Mr. Jana and Prof. Zuleta on the New York Convention’s enforcement regime and the enforcement of arbitral awards in Colombia, followed by a roundtable discussion between the judges and the speakers on key issues of due process and Colombian international public policy, among others. The speakers drew on case law from various jurisdictions to exemplify how these issues had been determined by other national court judges. 

ICCA thanks Mr. Jana and Prof. Zuleta for hosting the event, as well as the Colombian Council of State for their warm welcome and interest. ICCA hopes to continue carrying out its Roadshow programme in Spanish in other jurisdictions of Latin America in the months to come.