Analysis of 28 investment arbitration cases (including threats of claims) brought by sanctioned oligarchs or companies against EU Member States, Ukraine, the United Kingdom and Canada, through which they are claiming no less than USD 62 billion in total damages — an amount almost equivalent to the military assistance budget the EU has provided to Ukraine since 2022.

Florian Couveinhes Matsumoto and Sabrina Robert, Professors of Public Law and International Law, have produced for the Veblen Institute an in-depth analysis of the “Rebalancing Mechanism” of the EU-MERCOSUR Free Trade Agreement that we publish today. The note offers a review of rebalancing mechanisms already in place, which highlights the anachronistic nature of including such a mechanism in the EU-Mercosur Agreement; secondly, a detailed analysis of the conditions for implementing this rebalancing mechanism, which leaves many questions unanswered; thirdly, an examination of the risks of capture for the European regulator that arise from this mechanism.

In this note, Canopée and the Veblen Institute take stock of the impact of the implementation of the EU-Mercosur agreement on deforestation, as well as the EU regulation against deforestation. The brief also analyses the relevance of the proposed safeguards.