🇷🇺 🇰🇷 𝗔 𝗥𝘂𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗮𝗻 𝗖𝗼𝘂𝗿𝘁 𝗥𝗲𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗿𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗣𝗮𝗿𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗞𝗖𝗔𝗕 𝗔𝗿𝗯𝗶𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻.

A claimant, a company domiciled in the Republic of Korea, brought a legal action for debt recovery against a respondent, a Russian company, while the contract contained an arbitration clause providing for “an arbitration court at the claimant’s place of location.”

The wording “an arbitration court” might, in Russia, be interpreted as a reference to a state commercial court rather than to arbitration. Even if the claimant understood it that way, it still remains unclear why the Russian court was chosen, whereas the claimant’s place of location is in the Republic of Korea.

The respondent objected to the litigation and pointed out that the dispute should be resolved by arbitration.

The court emphasized that since the claimant is domiciled in the Republic of Korea, it must have known that there are no “arbitration courts” as state courts in the Republic of Korea. There is only one arbitral institution — the Korean Commercial Arbitration Board.

Some errors in the name of the adjudicating body were made in the arbitration clause; however, they did not in themselves lead to the invalidity of the arbitration clause, the court concluded.

Thus, the court left the statement of claim without consideration and referred the parties to arbitration.

The court’s ruling of September 16, 2025, in Case No. А51-22733/2024 may be appealed.

ProArbitration.Ru