New York Convention Roadshow in Sofia, Bulgaria

New York Convention Roadshow held for Bulgarian Judiciary and Arbitration Community

Report written by Velislava Hristova and Stanislav Cherkezov

On 26 September 2022, ICCA held a New York Convention Roadshow for the Bulgarian judiciary and arbitration community in hybrid form. The event was in Bulgarian and drew in more than 50 attendees in person and online, among which judges from the courts applying the New York Convention in Bulgaria, prominent arbitrators, lawyers, professors and students from Bulgarian universities. The Roadshow was co-hosted by ICCA, the Young Bulgarian Arbitration Practitioners and the Arbitration Court at the Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (AC at the BCCI).

The event began with a brief overview of ICCA’s activities and international commercial arbitration as a concept, introduced by Prof. Stanimir Alexandrov, current Vice-President of ICCA and ICCA President-Elect (starting in 2023).

Following this overview, Ms. Velislava Hristova, co-founder of Young Bulgarian Arbitration Practitioners and co-author of the Bulgarian translation of the ICCA Guide to the Interpretation of the 1958 New York Convention: A Handbook for Judges, gave a presentation on the history and objectives of the New York Convention, the success it has had since its entry into force in 1958 and on the enforcement of arbitration agreements by national court judges.

The issue of enforcement of arbitral awards under to the New York Convention was then addressed by Ms. Sylvia Tonova, a partner in the London office of Jones Day.

Mr. Alexander Katsarski, who is the vice-chairman of the AC at the BCCI, presented the topic of arbitration in Bulgaria and the application of the New York Convention by the Bulgarian courts.

The presentations were followed by a Q&A session moderated by Mr. Stanislav Cherkezov, co-founder of Young Bulgarian Arbitration Practitioners and co-author of the Bulgarian translation of the ICCA Guide, after which the chairman of the AC at the BCCI, Mr. Blagovest Punev, delivered closing remarks.

The lively discussion on the application of the New York Convention in Bulgaria that started during the Q&A session continued during the cocktail that followed. Participants were equipped with hard copies of the ICCA Guide, now available online in 27 languages, including Bulgarian.

For more details on ICCA’s New York Convention Roadshows, please consult our Judicial Outreach page.