UZBEKISTAN Law and Practice Contributed by: Sherzod Abdulkasimov, Nazokat Kamilova and Navruza Yunusova, PraeLegal Uzbekistan
Domestic awards are enforced through the same eco - nomic-court machinery under the EP Code, on appli - cation for a writ of execution, the Law on Domestic Arbitration prescribing refusal grounds corresponding in substance to those for foreign awards. 12.3 Approach of the Courts The courts’ approach to recognition and enforcement is increasingly favourable, reinforced by the 2023 Supreme Court Guidance and the EP Code proce - dure; refusal is confined to the exhaustive grounds of the New York Convention and the ICA Law. The public-policy ground is construed narrowly. It operates as a safeguard against awards that offend the fundamental principles of Uzbek law and justice, not as a means of policing divergence from ordinary domestic substantive rules; in substance, the courts apply the restrictive, international conception of pub - lic policy ( ordre public international ) rather than the whole body of mandatory domestic law. This is illus - trated by the ruling of the Supreme Court of 2 March 2023 enforcing an award issued under the rules of the Russian Arbitration Center. The debtor argued that enforcement offended public policy because the creditor had named a bank under US sanctions as its servicing bank; the court held that the existence of such sanctions did not of itself render enforcement contrary to, or a threat to, Uzbek public policy, and upheld the grant of enforcement. Domestic awards are not a perfect mirror. The Law on Domestic Arbitration enforces through a writ-of- execution procedure, not New York Convention-style recognition, and has no public-policy ground. A court may refuse a writ only on the grounds listed in Article 47 – invalidity, excess of scope, want of proper notice, improper composition or procedure, non-arbitrability, and breach of the applicable-law rules. These are exhaustive and bar any review of the merits. 13. Miscellaneous 13.1 Class Action or Group Arbitration Uzbek law makes no provision for class or group arbi - tration. Neither the ICA Law nor the Law on Domestic Arbitration contemplates collective or representative
claims, and no mechanism binds a class of unnamed claimants to a single arbitration. This follows from the consensual basis of arbitration: jurisdiction rests on agreement, so only those who have consented may be joined. Multiparty proceed - ings are possible only where all parties are bound by the same agreement, and even then, the tribunal is constituted by the parties’ agreement or the chosen institutional rules, not by any class mechanism. 13.2 Ethical Codes There is no arbitration-specific statutory code of eth - ics in Uzbekistan; the applicable standards come from several overlapping sources. For arbitrators, the governing standards are the stat - utory duties of independence, impartiality and con - tinuing disclosure under the ICA Law (and the corre - sponding eligibility and disclosure requirements of the Law on Domestic Arbitration for domestic arbitration), supplemented by the conduct rules and codes of eth - ics of the chosen arbitral institution. For counsel, the position depends on their qualifi - cation. A locally licensed advocate is bound by the Law “On Advocacy” (ZRU-349-I, 27 December 1996) and the Rules of Professional Ethics of Advocates, enforced through the Chamber of Advocates of the Republic of Uzbekistan; foreign lawyers appearing in an arbitration seated in Uzbekistan remain subject to the professional and ethical rules of their home Bar. 13.3 Third-Party Funding Uzbekistan has no specific legislation or rules gov - erning third-party funding of arbitration or litigation. Neither the ICA Law nor the Law on Domestic Arbitra - tion addresses the practice, and there is no statutory regime imposing licensing, capital, disclosure or con - trol requirements on funders, nor any express prohibi - tion of the kind associated with the old doctrines of maintenance and champerty. 13.4 Consolidation Neither the ICA Law nor the Law on Domestic Arbi - tration confers a power to consolidate separate arbi - tral proceedings, and the courts have no such power either. Consolidation is therefore not available as a
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