sayyed nasrollah ebrahimi

One of the major challenges of online arbitration in recent years, has been that some companies and traders have abused their superior economic position (especially in e-commerce field) against the weaker parties to the contract;  for instance, they have attempted to insert some unfair terms in the contract without clear notification to other party, or they have excessively approached to such tribunals, so that, strengthened the assumption of colluding and influencing managers and arbitrator working in those tribunals. These problems have raised some concerns and questions in the minds of policymakers and jurists about role of government in balancing power between litigants, as well as the philosophy and principles of monitoring the performance of online arbitration tribunals.The present article, beside describing these unfair terms and unbalanced conditions between disputed parties; analyzing the legal and judicial procedure of pioneer countries in the field of ODR (US and EU) and examining the local law of Iran; attempts, for the purpose of providing effective support for the weaker parties, to submit some useful and practical recommendations, by taking into account of principle of fair trial, goals of e-Government and also the principles of transparency and participation as the main principles of good governance.

Following surge increase of disputes arising out of technology developments, and especially rapid growth of e-commerce and different interactions in the cyberspace within recent decades (which some authors called it "Tsunami of Disputes"); many states, private companies and entities, at the end of second Millennium, were impelled to apply Information and Communications Technologies in the dispute settlement mechanisms. During last decade, with the help of modern Information and Communications Technologies, many different new and sophisticated models emerged and implemented, around the world, for facilitating and enhancing Online Dispute Resolutions, among them, one of the most important and efficient one has become well-known as "Crowdsourcing Online Disputes Resolution (CODR)".This new technology, by relying on "Wisdom of Crowd", conveyed much better capacities and opportunities to settle the disputes peacefully and without any need to recourse to Judicial Authorities. The present article, beside specifying the capacities of this new methods as well as analyzing their opportunities and challenges demonstrates that in order to reach fast, fair, more peaceful and cheaper methods of dispute settlements, exploiting the capacities of new models of ODR would be crucial, urgent and unavoidable, especially by considering the possibility of increase of conflicts because of Covid-19 virus out-breaking disaster and the financial and physiological crisis therefrom and the high volume of disputes in the judiciary system of our country.

Does the violation of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) because of withdrawing or claiming of violation and subsequently to implement sanctions again cause to the exemption or suspension of oil industry in upstream area? It is a disputable subject that if the exercising of sanctions are instances of force majeure or it is counted of the difficulty of practicing the agreement. The main provision for occurring the force majeure is to be the happening foreseeable and to be uncontrollable. Pursuant to the content of the paragraph 14 and 15 of 2231 resolution of the UN Security Council, the applied sanction is effective to the contracts signed after the date of sanction. The occurrence of sanction cannot merely result the happening of force majeure because if the sanction is predictable, it cannot be of the instances of the force majeure. In this circumstance it can be said that the sanction can be considered of instances of the difficulty of the implementation of the agreement. In Articles 227 and 229 frustrations of contract has been mentioned and in the law of Iran it is accepted. But what has been stated under Articles 227 and 229 merely observing frustration of contract (refers to a particular way in which contractual obligations can be discharged) subsequently it will be the material damage of the subject of responsibility which the force majeure makes it occur which in the oil contract the material damage has not happened because this kind of the oil contracts is ongoing. For this reason in the recent amendment (the regulations observing the conclusion and performance of oil agreements) it has been explicitly stated that it should be observed the paragraphs 14 and 15 of 2231 resolution in the situation of drawing up agreement (contract) this subject indicates that it is not any more considered as one of instances of force majeure in the upstream oil agreements .Therefore, it is necessary to observe sanction as of instances of difficulty to perform the agreements that it leads to regulate the agreement.

Taking into account of rapid growth of international trade and the dramatic increase of the disputes arisen therefrom, it is indispensable to recognize the opportunities and challenges of "Electronic Alternative Dispute Resolutions (EADR)" for commercial disputes and to identify the conditions of interventions by the relevant governmental entities in the regulation and control of activities of online arbitration or mediation tribunals.This Article, at first, describes the history, opportunities and challenges of “EADR” and prevailing obstacles hindering its development and then, in the following sections, we will endeavor to clarify the roles and function of Judicial Power in its support, contributionand supervision for the development of “EADR”.As a conclusion, any intervention by the Judiciary Power in these activities must be planed and executed in the close cooperation with other relevant governmental and non-governmental entities so that no parallel action occurs in these regards and any inconsistent or insular official program is avoided. In addition, the prerequisites for the recognition and enforcement of online dispute resolutions should be identified in more details. Thus, we must try to provide coherent judicial precedent and realize and introduce the potentials and specific roles that the Judiciary Power can play in these reagrds..

Since the LNG projects are so capital intensive, often financers do not finance in these projects without making sure about its certain income stream. The main instrument to reach into this certainty for the sellers and financers is inserting the “Take or Pay” clause in the contract. Therefore, today the “take or pay” clause has become the defining characteristic of long term LNG sales contracts. In different legal regimes, some doubts have been raised against the validity and enforceability of this clause. In addition with changing feature of LNG projects, it seems that traditional “take or pay” clauses have lost their efficiency and we need to step back and reevaluate the traditional “take or pay” structure in today’s evolving LNG marketplace. Considering the validity and enforceability of “take or pay” clauses in different legal regimes and the reasons of their inefficiency and finding some ways to improve the efficiency has been considered in this article.