Michael Snarr, counsel in Baker Hostetler's Washington D.C., office, was interviewed and quoted in an April 2010 briefing paper prepared by the Economist Intelligence Unit for the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission. The paper was a research report prepared at the request of the Commission to assess the implications of a bilateral investment treaty (or "BIT") currently being negotiated between the United States and China.
A frequent concern of U.S. policymakers about BITs is that they provide foreign investors with new, enforceable legal rights that could bring a flood of monetary judgments against the United States government and could undermine the judicial system. Snarr explained that such fears have not been realized in the outcomes of international arbitration awards under those agreements and that U.S. courts have not assumed original jurisdiction over claims for violations of a BIT. "In other words," Snarr explained, "the district court would say that to the extent a foreign investor may claim any relief under the BIT, such relief is provided explicitly through the arbitration mechanisms in the agreement and not to be applied in U.S. courts except to enforce an arbitration award rendered by a tribunal under the agreement."
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