April 23, 2019
Publication: Mealy's International Arbitration Report
A team of Kobre & Kim attorneys – Jef Klazen, Chris Cogburn and Lara Levinson – detail strategies of enforcing judgements against elusive foreign governments or state-owned entities in the Lexis Nexis’ monthly arbitration newsletter, Mealey's International Arbitration Report.
“Many who hold defaulted sovereign debt or have launched ill-fated business ventures with foreign states have learned a painful lesson: a favorable judgment or arbitration award is rarely the end of the fight,” the team explains. “The process of securing judgments against foreign governments or state-owned entities is now routine, but enforcing those judgments remains uniquely difficult.”
Drawing from their experience in judgment enforcement – including enforcements against a prominent African nation and another against one of the world’s largest state-owned oil companies— the team provides proven strategies for realizing enforcement. They detail how taking an “aggressive, creative, multijurisdictional approach” through both judicial and non-judicial tactics can apply the global pressure necessary to compel sovereign entities to pay up.