For more than 50 years, we have served as trusted advisors, litigators and strategists to more than 100 sovereign governments, state-owned entities and sovereign wealth funds in protecting against and confronting litigation in the US and around the world. Our sovereign clients embrace many of the world’s most dynamic and emerging markets in the Middle East, Africa, throughout Europe, Latin America and Asia. We represent our clients in litigation and disputes involving investment and bilateral investment treaty disputes, construction and infrastructure projects, territorial disputes, trade, and matters related to human rights, environmental issues and other issues of public international law and domestic statutes, including in the US, the ATA and FSIA.
Our Sovereign Litigation team is at the nexus of law, government and business, championing clients’ interests in courts and international tribunals around the world, as well as before the European Commission and Congress on a wide array of jurisdictional and sovereign immunity issues and the extraterritorial application of domestic law. Our team includes not only trial lawyers who are internationally recognized for their work in sovereign-related litigation, but also former US senators, ambassadors and members of US Department of State and European Commission, who have helped sovereigns navigate sensitive international relations directly tied to US and other domestic litigation, cross-border disputes and international relations.
We actively track policy and case law as it pertains to our clients’ commercial interests globally, and because of the strength of our legislative and diplomacy teams, we are able to advocate on our clients’ behalf in the halls of power – in the US, EU and many countries across the globe. For instance, we serve as the outside general counsel for many embassies in the US, providing day-to-day support on legal matters and local regulatory issues that may arise, including those that relate to the application of sovereign and diplomatic immunity.
Why Choose Us
- Decades of experience successfully defending sovereign clients in the US courts against Alien Tort Statute (ATS) and FSIA lawsuits
- Deep relationships and qualifications with the US Department of State and other government agencies to secure immunity determinations and other governmental support for defenses
- Representing sovereign governments and their leaders in the International Criminal Court, the International Court of Justice and various other international tribunals
- Representing governments around the world on boundary disputes in some of the most important and challenging cases of the last four decades, including in the Middle East, Africa, Asia, North America, Latin America and the Arctic
- Leader in bilateral investment treaty arbitration involving banking and monetary regulation, the oil and gas industry, electrical generation and gold mining
- Extensive experience in cross-border issues involving jurisdiction, choice-of-law, extraterritorial application of US and other countries’ laws, cross-border discovery under multilateral conventions and forum selection
- Distinctive experience and insight on developing legal systems emerging countries and regions
- Strong local presence and connections, enabling us to obtain timely judicial assistance, such as injunctions and emergency stays, allowing clients’ global business to continue unfettered by legal proceedings
- Membership in the international Chamber of Commerce FraudNet and other European anticorruption asset-tracing organizations
- Listed in the 2015 Global Arbitration Review Top 30 of international arbitration practices and nominated for “Large International Arbitration Practice that Impressed in the Past Year”
- Complementary diplomatic support and insight from former US senators and several former ministers of foreign affairs and ambassadors to more than a dozen countries, including the United Nations