Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards in Civil and Commercial Matters in Ethiopia

Abstract

Ethiopia is not yet party to the New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards. It can also be said that Ethiopian arbitration laws fail to cope with the emerging modern laws and practices in international commercial arbitration. However, as of 1965, with the introduction of the Civil Procedure Code (CPC), rules on the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments and arbitral awards are set out whose interpretation, unfortunately, have remained thus far inconsistent. Thus, the criteria must be clearly interpreted and applied so that the rules can be conducive to the steadily increasing practice of modern arbitration. This article attempts to shed some light on these conditions.

Key words: Foreign arbitral awards, commercial arbitration, enforcement of foreign judgments, Ethiopia.