Nicolas Angelet

Practice Areas

I am a general practitioner of public international law with a focus on investment law and dispute settlement, international environmental and climate change, immunities, international organisations and armed conflict. I serve as an arbitrator in investment cases and act as counsel and expert in other areas. I appear before the International Court of Justice, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, the European Court of Justice and the General Court of the European Union, and domestic tribunals in Belgium and other EU Member States.

Career

I am an attorney at the Brussels Bar and an Associate Tenant of Doughty Street Chambers, London.

I am also a professor of public international law at the Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium where I teach international economic law, international investment law and dispute settlement, and international law issues of climate change. I am also a professor at Ghent University, Belgium, where I am in charge of the general course of public international law, and peaceful settlement of international disputes; I am a foreign faculty member in the LLM in investment treaty arbitration at Uppsala University, Sweden, and a visiting professor in international climate change law at Sorbonne University Abu Dhabi.

Professional Memberships

I am the current president of the Belgian Society of International Law, and a member of the American Society of International Law, the German Society of International Law, the French Society of International Law, the Investment Treaty Forum of the British Institute of International and Comparative Law, among others.

I am or have been a member of the Task Force for the revision of the IBA Guidelines on Conflicts of Interest, a member of the ICC Task Force on Addressing Issues of Corruption in International Arbitration, and co-chair of the International Arbitration Institute Working Group on Strenghtening the Right of Defense in Investor-State Dispute Settlement.

Publications

Recent publications include:

“Fair and Equitable Treatment”, in Max Planck Encyclopedia of Public International Law, revised edition, 2022, 29 p.

“The Drafting of Awards in Investor-State Arbitration”, in: Fabrizio Marella and Nicola Soldati, eds., Liber amicorum Giorgio Bernini, Giuffrè, 2021, p. 271-293.

Expert in these Jurisdictions

I serve as an arbitrator, president of arbitral tribunals and member of annulment committees in investor-state dispute settlement.

I appear as counsel before the International Court of Justice, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, arbitral tribunals, United Nations bodies, the European Court of Justice and the EU General Court, and domestic courts in Belgium and (together with local counsel) other Member States of the European Union.

Languages Spoken

Active knowledge of French, English, Dutch, German. Passive knowledge of Italian, basic knowledge of Spanish (reading of international law texts).

Work Highlights

Counsel to the Democratic Republic of Congo before the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, Request for an Advisory Opinion submitted by the Commission of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law.

Counsel to the Democratic Republic of Congo before the International Court of Justice, Request for an advisory opinion on the obligations of States in respect of climate change, submitted by General Assembly Resolution 77/276.

Counsel to the Moroccan intervening parties before the European Court of Justice in joint cases C-779/21 P, C-799/21 P, and in joint cases C-778/21 P and C-798/21 P, Polisario Front v. Council and Commission of the European Union, French Republic, Kingdom of Spain and Moroccan business associations intervening.

Counsel to the appellants in Tavares a.o. v. Kingdom of Belgium, Brussels Court of Appeal: responsibility of the Belgian State for the treatment of children of mixed African and European descent during the colonial era – substantive and temporal scope of application of the incrimination of crimes against humanity – continuous violations of human rights.

Expert witness on questions of public international law before the Supreme Court of British Columbia in the case of The Attorney General of Canada on behalf of the United States of America v [Huawei CFO] Wanzhou Meng.

President of the Arbitral Tribunal, Venezuela Holdings B.V. and others v. Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, ICSID Case No. ARB/07/27, resubmission.

Expert witness on the law of treaties in cases T-279/19 and T-344/19 before the General Court of the European Union.

Member of the Belgian team in the proceedings on request for advisory opinion 1/17 of the European Court of Justice on the compatibility of the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA) with the law of the European Union.

Counsel to Yukos Universal Ltd. in Belgian recognition and enforcement proceedings in Yukos Universal Ltd. v. Russian Federation.

Counsel to the European Space Agency in various contentious and non-contentious matters.

Counsel to the Kingdom of Belgium in ICSID Case No. ARB/12/29, Ping An Life Insurance Company, Limited and Ping An Insurance (Group) Company, Limited v. Belgium (2012-2015).

Counsel to the Kingdom of Belgium in the Iron Rhine Arbitration (Kingdom of Belgium v. Kingdom of the Netherlands), PCA Case No. 2003-02.