Domestic and international commercial arbitration, institutional and ad hoc.
The firm provides specialist legal services in domestic and international arbitration: drafting arbitration agreements and clauses, representing clients through every stage of the proceedings, preparing pleadings and defences, recognition and enforcement of awards, and applications to set awards aside in the cases the law permits. We also advise on alternative dispute resolution.
Arbitration in Qatar rests on the Law of Arbitration in Civil and Commercial Matters issued by Law No. 2 of 2017, aligned with the UNCITRAL Model Law. It affirms the separability of the arbitration clause and the tribunal's competence to rule on its own jurisdiction, limits court intervention, and empowers tribunals to grant interim measures. Qatar is also a party to the New York Convention, which supports enforcement of Qatari awards abroad and foreign awards in Qatar.
We give particular attention to drafting the arbitration clause before any dispute arises: the institution, seat, language, governing law and number of arbitrators are all settled by that clause alone, and many cases are lost procedurally because it was drafted in haste. The agreement must be in writing and the signatory expressly authorised, a decisive practical point for companies.
Once an award is issued we handle enforcement before the Qatari courts, or defend annulment proceedings, an action confined to narrow grounds such as invalidity of the agreement, breach of the right to be heard or conflict with public policy, and bound by strict time limits that cannot be treated lightly.
How we help
- Drafting and reviewing arbitration clauses and agreements
- Representation in institutional and ad hoc arbitration
- Pleadings, defences and evidence management
- Interim measures before tribunals and courts
- Construction, joint-venture and banking disputes
- Enforcement of domestic and foreign awards
- Defending annulment actions
- Mediation, conciliation and ADR
In Qatar
Arbitration in Qatar is governed by the Law of Arbitration in Civil and Commercial Matters, issued by Law No. 2 of 2017. It replaced the old regime in Articles 190 to 210 of Book One of the Civil and Commercial Procedure Law (Law No. 13 of 1990), which Article 4 of the 2017 Law expressly repealed, and it follows the structure of the UNCITRAL Model Law. By Article 3 it applies to arbitrations commencing after it came into force, so an older clause can still fall to be read against the previous rules.
The feature that most often surprises parties is which court supervises the arbitration. Under Article 1 the “Competent Court” is the Civil and Commercial Arbitral Disputes Circuit of the Court of Appeal, not an ordinary court of first instance. Where the parties so agree, it is instead the First Instance Circuit of the Civil and Commercial Court of the Qatar Financial Centre. That choice is made in the contract, years before any dispute, and it determines which bench will hear an application to set aside or to enforce.
Foreign awards are enforceable in Qatar under the New York Convention, to which the State acceded on 30 December 2002 and which entered into force for Qatar on 30 March 2003, ratified domestically by Decree No. 29 of 2003. In practice enforcement still turns on procedure: the award and the arbitration agreement must be produced in the required form, with an Arabic translation where the original is in another language.