The enforcement in England & Wales of an ICSID award cannot be assigned to a third party without consent of the respondent State.
On 6 September 2019 an arbitration award (the Award) was rendered against Spain in an arbitration conducted under the Convention on the Settlement of Investment Disputes between States and Nationals of Other States (the ICSID Convention). The Award gave damages to Blasket Renewable Investments LLC (Blasket)under the Energy Charter Treaty (ECT) following Spain’s revocation of certain tariffs and incentives with respect to renewable energy projects in the country
After registering the Award in the UK, Blasket filed an application to enforce it. Thereafter, Blasket made an application for an order to be substituted for Operafund Eco-Invest Sicav Plc (the Claimant) in the enforcement proceedings. The substitution was sought on the basis of an assignment agreement between the Claimant and Blasket purporting to assign “…all of the rights, interests and benefits of the Assignors under or in respect of the Award.” Spain objected to the substitution on the grounds that the State had not given express permission for the assignment and, otherwise, the Award was not assignable under public international law and the terms of the relevant treaties.
The Commercial Court refused the substitution. It took the view that the phrases “a party” and “the parties” referred to, respectively, in Articles 54(2) and 53(1) of the ICSID Convention could not mean “anyone other than a party to the arbitration in which the award to be registered had been rendered.” Insofar as it concerns public international law, the Court found there was no rule or principle that either supports or prohibits the assignment of awards made in ICSID awards. According to the Court, “it is implausible that the authors of the ICSID Convention could have intended that the assignability of an award made pursuant to it would be left to the random effects of local law with the result that whether an award was assignable would depend on which state the award was being enforced in with the very real possibility that assignment may be permitted in some jurisdictions where enforcement was sought but not others. It is in order to avoid such outcomes that issues concerning assignability depend on the governing law of the contract or in this case Convention – that is in this case the ICSID Convention and the ECT.”
Operafund Eco‑Invest Sicav Plc & Anor v Spain [2025] EWHC 2874 (Comm)
