CHINA Law and Practice Contributed by: Paul Zhou and Leslie Shen, SGLA Law Firm
intellectual property (IP) and technology licensing; and (vii) internet and e-commerce. Belt and Road Initiative- related arbitrations increasingly concern energy, trans - portation, telecommunications and power generation projects. According to CIETAC’s 2023 Annual Report, international trade disputes accounted for 32% of all cases, followed by construction (18%), finance (15%), and corporate and equity disputes (12%). The intersection of data compliance and arbitration has emerged as a particularly complex area. In a 2025 CIETAC case involving a cloud services agreement between a Chinese provider and a European Union- based client, the tribunal was called upon to deter - mine the applicability of the EU General Data Pro - tection Regulation (GDPR) to documents stored on servers located in China. The tribunal held that, while the GDPR does not have extraterritorial effect on data located in China, the parties’ agreement to conduct evidentiary hearings in Geneva implicitly waived any objection to cross-border data transfer for arbitra - tion purposes. This decision illustrates the delicate balance that tribunals in China must strike between domestic data localisation requirements and interna - tional arbitration practice. 1.3 Arbitration Institutions The principal arbitral institutions in China that handle international and foreign-related commercial disputes are: (i) the China International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission (CIETAC), the largest institu - tion in terms of foreign-related caseload; (ii) the Beijing Arbitration Commission/Beijing International Arbitra - tion Center (BAC/BIAC); (iii) the Shanghai International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission (SHIAC); (iv) the Shenzhen Court of International Arbitration (SCIA); (v) the China Maritime Arbitration Commission, which specialises in maritime and shipping disputes; and (vi) the Guangzhou Arbitration Commission. All of the aforementioned institutions have revised their respective rules to incorporate the reforms introduced by the 2025 Amendment, notably the provisions on competence-competence, the seat of arbitration, and ad hoc arbitration for foreign-related disputes. Several new arbitration institutions and representative offices were established in 2024, reflecting the grow - ing internationalisation of Chinese arbitration. These
include the Chongqing International Commercial Arbi - tration Court (inaugurated on 12 November 2024); the Beijing Representative Office of HKIAC (registered in December 2024, the first foreign arbitration institu - tion representative office in Beijing); and the China (Shanghai) Securities and Futures Arbitration Center (launched on 26 December 2024). 1.4 National Courts The people’s courts in China perform a supervisory and supportive function in respect of arbitral pro - ceedings. Their statutory functions include: (i) provid - ing evidentiary assistance to arbitral tribunals upon request under Article 55 of the 2025 Arbitration Law; (ii) deciding on applications for interim measures, including property preservation, evidence preserva - tion and conduct preservation; (iii) determining appli - cations to set aside arbitral awards under Article 71 of the 2025 Arbitration Law; and (iv) recognising and enforcing arbitral awards pursuant to the Civil Proce - dure Law and the New York Convention. The Supreme People’s Court (SPC) issues judicial interpretations that provide authoritative guidance to lower courts on arbitration-related matters. The 2025 Arbitration Law strengthened the supportive role of the courts while reaffirming the principle of limited judicial intervention in the arbitral process. The primary source of arbitration law in China is the Arbitration Law of the People’s Republic of China (2025 Amendment), which entered into force on 1 March 2026. The supporting statutory framework includes: (i) the Civil Procedure Law of the PRC (2023 Amendment), particularly Article 304, which govern the recognition and enforcement of foreign arbitral awards; (ii) the Civil Code of the PRC (2021), which governs the substantive rights and obligations under the underlying commercial contract; and (iii) judicial interpretations issued by the SPC, most notably the 2006 Interpretation of the Supreme People’s Court on Certain Issues Concerning the Application of the Arbitration Law of the PRC (the “2006 SPC Arbitra - tion Interpretation”), together with subsequent sup - plemental interpretations and guiding opinions. For 2. Governing Legislation 2.1 Governing Law
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