Mining Weekly | 1 April 2021
French Supreme Court overturns lower court’s Rusoro damages award
By: Donna Slater
Canadian junior Rusoro Mining reports that the French Supreme Court – the Cour de Cassation – has overturned the decision of the Paris Court of Appeal, which had annulled part of the damages portion of the arbitral award previously rendered in favour of the company.
In August 2016, Rusoro was awarded $967.77-million in damages by the Arbitration Tribunal, operating under the World Bank’s International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) in an arbitration brought by Rusoro against Venezuela.
Rusoro filed its request for arbitration before ICSID in July 2012 under the Canada-Venezuela Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT). In its award, the tribunal upheld Rusoro’s claims that Venezuela breached its obligations under the BIT by unlawfully expropriating Rusoro’s investments without paying compensation and by imposing certain restrictions on the export of gold.
Rusoro president and CEO Andre Agapov notes that this decision reinstates the arbitral award in full and will enable the company to continue to vigorously pursue recognition and enforcement of the award, the value of which is currently about $1.58-billion. This compares to the original award amount of $967.77-million, plus about $612.23-million of interest as calculated by Rusoro.
Rusoro intends to pursue all available options to collect on the reinstated award or otherwise obtain fair compensation for the unlawful expropriation of its investments in Venezuela.