Challenges of the Knowledge Society (Jul 2015)
ENFORCING ARBITRAL AWARDS IN ROMANIA - ALWAYS A CHALLENGE
Abstract
Securing a favourable award from a foreign or domestic arbitral court proves to be in many cases only half the battle. As a rule, Romanian law and courts acknowledge the final, binding and enforceable nature of arbitration awards and state the principle that arbitration awards shall be freely implemented by parties. However, there are instances where the unsuccessful party does not voluntarily perform the obligations arising from the arbitral award. In these cases, before incurring legal expenses on formal enforcement procedures, it is worth attempting several informal or indirect means of persuading the other party to honour its duties. If the opposing party still refuses to comply with the award, one may resort to an ordinary enforcement procedure. In Romania, enforcement procedures may be conducted by judicial executors only after the arbitral award is rendered enforceable by a domestic court of law. As in most developed states, the vast majority of Romanian courts have enforced both domestic and foreign arbitral awards. Although there are certain instances when arbitral awards have been denied enforcement, these are the exception rather than the rule because under Romanian law the right of refusal to comply with the arbitral award shall be exerted only through an action of annulment for limited reasons.
