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Trade tools for climate action: investor-state dispute settlement reform
10-Jul-2025 Council of Foreign Relations
Although fossil fuel phase-outs are critical to achieving global climate goals, protections granted through Investor-State Dispute Settlement provisions to foreign-owned coal operations expose governments to costly litigation, threatening to thwart state action.
Malaysian civil society groups urge government to reject investor-state dispute settlement clause in RCEP deal
9-Jul-2025 The Edge Malaysia
Malaysian CSOs have urged the government to reject the inclusion of the ISDS clause in the RCEP agreement. They warn that ISDS allows foreign investors to sue governments over policies safeguarding public interests like health, workers, and the environment, potentially leading to costly legal battles and large payouts detrimental to national budgets.
Aftershock in Groningen
2-Jul-2025 SOMO
How Shell and ExxonMobil use arbitration to offload the costs of closing the Netherlands’ largest gas field.
Statement on the voices of Thai civil society regarding the free trade agreement between Thailand and the European Union
24-Jun-2025 FTA Watch
Thai civil society organizations expressing serious concerns about the ongoing Free Trade Agreement (FTA) negotiations between Thailand and the European Union (EU), highlight potential negative impacts on agriculture, food security, environment, labor rights, public health, and other social issues.
Protecting foreign investments in clean energy projects from regulatory changes
2-Jun-2025 E3G
By protecting fossil fuel investments, investment treaties with ISDS are undermining the global energy transition. This briefing explores three alternative tools that may protect foreign investors from regulatory changes.
JBS profits from EU-Mercosur deal
30-May-2025 Greenpeace
EU-Mercosur trade deal set to boost profits for world’s biggest meat company – at the expense of sustainable food systems.
Ending the era of investor-state dispute settlement
28-May-2025 Global Development Policy Center
To accomplish the removal of ISDS efficiently, G7 countries, or some subset of them, could lead the development of a plurilateral agreement to alter all IIAs amongst the parties that sign up to it.
Recent fossil fuel arbitration claims based on the ECT: the urgency of neutralizing the sunset clause
23-May-2025 Veblen
The Energy Charter Treaty (“ECT”), the most widely used investment treaty, has become highly controversial for enabling investors to challenge national policies aimed at achieving climate goals through its ISDS mechanism, leading to a phenomenon known as “regulatory chill.
Dangerous precedent: How an arbitration claim is jeopardising Germany‘s coal phase-out
20-May-2025 Power Shift
A Swiss public company, Azienda Elettrica Ticinese, is demanding compensation in an international arbitration tribunal for Germany‘s coal phase-out.
If Argentina leaves Paris Agreement, Mercosur deal still stands for other countries
12-May-2025 EU News
Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic clarifies the rules and scope of the free trade agreement with the South American bloc. The principle is suspension with the individual state.
The climate crisis & the threat of investment agreements
2-May-2025 Ngā Toki Whakarururanga
Aussie mining billionaire sues Australia for A$420 billion... Yes, this could happen in Aotearoa!!!
End harmful treaties, says Nalunga
25-Apr-2025 Monitor
Treaties and agreements should facilitate a green and equitable transition by channeling investments into renewable energy, circular economies, and sustainable infrastructure.
Energy Charter Treaty irrelevant to Africa
15-Apr-2025 Monitor
The Energy Charter Treaty not only locks countries into outdated fossil fuel investments but also hampers their ability to pursue sustainable, climate-friendly energy policies.
Thousands of people protest for more climate protection
14-Apr-2025 blue News
In Bern, several hundred people on the Bundesplatz criticized the federal government, which wants to modernize the International Energy Charter Treaty that came into force in 1998. They called for an exit.
The climate impact of the EU trade agreement with Colombia, Peru and Ecuador
31-Mar-2025 Power Shift
Instead of supporting sustainable development, the agreement has primarily facilitated trade in environmentally harmful goods, and has also failed to introduce effective mechanisms to address sustainability challenges.
Allowing foreign firms to sue governments for lost profits is legal terrorism – it must end
10-Mar-2025 The Guardian
Investor–state dispute settlements don’t just mean growing debt burdens for countries: they are also a barrier to action on the climate crisis.
Why fear of billion-dollar lawsuits stops countries phasing out fossil fuels
7-Mar-2025 The Guardian
Companies can sue governments for closing oilfields and mines – and the risk of huge damages is already stopping countries from passing green laws, ministers say.
EU-Mercosur Agreement: Old pledges, new potential impacts for food systems and a just transition
27-Feb-2025 IATP
The EU-Mercosur Agreement continues with the narrative that it ensures environmental clauses and climate commitments, in practice it implements measures that could divert means and resources that could otherwise be used for a genuine, just, ecological and inclusive transition.
Re-imagining trade for people and the planet
24-Feb-2025 rabble.ca
Progressive new trade policies and agreements driven by global environmental objectives, as well as decades-old attempts through the United Nations General Assembly to reshape the global trade system and decolonize it, offer some direction.
Trade deal fueling resource grab? 120+ groups from Europe and Indonesia sound the alarm
18-Feb-2025 European Trade Justice Coalition
Over 120 civil society organizations and trade unions from Indonesia and Europe today call on the Indonesian government and the EU to stop the negotiations for the Indonesia-EU free trade agreement – the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA). The organizations warn that this agreement threatens the environment, climate, and the rights of women, Indigenous Peoples, workers, small farmers and fisherfolk.