WTO Disputes
Drawing on the firm’’s global resources, Sidley is the only firm providing WTO legal services from offices in Geneva, Washington, D.C. and Brussels. Our team of professionals assists companies, governments, and trade associations worldwide on the enforcement of the complex web of global trading rules regulating international commerce. The WTO is at the center of that web, and is also at the center of our trade team’s practice.
Sidley’s WTO practitioners:
- assist business, trade association, and government clients facing market access barriers or unfair conditions of competition in foreign markets by successfully integrating WTO arguments into their advocacy with governments;
- counsel private and government clients on strategies for enforcing WTO commitments through WTO dispute settlement, including analyzing WTO law, preparing claims and defenses, and appearing as counsel or supporting government counsel in all procedural phases of proceedings before the WTO panels and the Appellate Body; and
- advise clients on structuring transactions and investments to take account of WTO law as interpreted through jurisprudence.
Sidley is distinguished in having not just one or two, but dozens of professionals who have been directly involved “from the inside” in the development of WTO law and jurisprudence – in the private sector, as government litigators, and as members of the WTO secretariat assisting panels and the Appellate Body in resolving disputes. For an overview of the former government positions held by Sidley lawyers in the international trade arena,
click here.
The quality of our practice has been recognized by our clients and peers alike. We hold the
Chambers Global Award for “Global WTO Law Firm of the Year”, and our team has been named by
Who’s Who Legal as the “Global Trade and Customs Law Firm of the Year” every year since the award’s inception in 2005.
Chambers’ research reveals that clients praise Sidley as “
the most renowned team in Geneva, where its name is synonymous with WTO instructions and expertise”, that “
Sidley’s WTO expertise as a group is unrivalled” and that Sidley is “
on everybody’s shortlist for WTO representation”. Many members of our team have also been identified as top WTO practitioners by
Chambers and other rating organizations.
WTO Dispute Settlement
More than 400 complaints have been brought to the WTO’s dispute settlement system since its establishment in 1995. These cases have generated a body of law and practice as sophisticated as any specialized area of domestic law. While in private practice, or in earlier service with Member Governments and the WTO Secretariat, members of Sidley’s WTO team have been involved in more than half of these disputes – more than any other law firm. Our experience means that we have mastered not only the substance of the WTO rules, but also the procedures involved in WTO settlement. Our WTO litigators have been involved in every procedural phase of WTO dispute settlement – from consultations, to panel and Appellate Body proceedings, and from implementation challenges, to arbitration regarding retaliatory measures. We have a broad-based practice that includes representation of WTO Members as complainants, respondents, and third parties, in dispute settlement proceedings.
For example, our professionals have served recently as counsel to:
- Airbus S.A.S., commercial stakeholders standing behind the European Union, in the subsidies disputes, European Communities – Measures Affecting Trade in Large Civil Aircraft and United States – Measures Affecting Trade in Large Civil Aircraft;
- The U.S. biotechnology industry in a WTO dispute with the European Communities and its member states on their ongoing failure to process applications for approval of new agricultural biotech products, European Communities – Measures Affecting the Marketing and Approval of Biotech Products;
- The Government of Norway in support of a comprehensive challenge to an EC anti-dumping determination regarding farmed salmon from Norway, European Communities – Anti-Dumping Measure on Farmed Salmon from Norway;
- AT&T in support of the United States’ challenge to Mexican market access and anti-competitive restrictions on international long distance telecommunications services, Mexico – Measures Affecting Telecommunications Services;
- The Government of Brazil:
- in support of a WTO challenge against U.S. domestic support and export subsidies for upland cotton and a host of other agricultural products, United States – Subsidies for Upland Cotton; and
- in defense of a challenge by the European Communities to import measures regarding retreaded tyres, Brazil - Measures Affecting the Import of Retreaded Tyres;
- Anheuser-Busch in support of a challenge by the United States to the European Communities’ regulation on the protection of geographical indications, European Communities – Protection of Trademarks and Geographical Indications for Agricultural Products and Foodstuffs; and
- The Government of Japan (Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry and Ministry of Foreign Affairs) in several WTO proceedings concerning the United States’ use of the “zeroing” policy in anti-dumping proceedings.
For a more extensive, representative list of WTO cases in which Sidley lawyers have been involved, see below. For a list of WTO publications,
click here.
WTO Experience
Sidley Updates
News & Media
Publications