Bilateral Investment Treaties (BITs)
On Wednesday 26th October, 45 people became increasingly dismayed and angry by the talk ‘How Companies Sue States’ given by Claire Provost, investigative journalist
In 2009 a multinational mining company sued the Salvadoran Government, not just for the money that it had spent prospecting but also for money it said it might receive in profits if the operation was successful! At one point, the total ISDS claim was over $300m.
The company eventually lost the case, but that didn’t mean that El Salvador had won. Even though the company was eventually ordered to pay $8million dollars towards the country’s legal costs, El Salvador had spent $12 million, as well as time and trouble, fighting the case. Claire said, “In these types of cases there no winners, only losers.”
