On September 26, 2013, the Appeals Chamber for the Special Court for Sierra Leone (Special Court) unanimously upheld the Trial Chamber’s conviction of Charles Ghankay Taylor, the former President of Liberia, and affirmed his fifty-year sentence for aiding and abetting rebel forces in Sierra Leone that perpetrated brutal crimes during the civil war in Sierra Leone. The Appeals Chamber’s judgment followed an almost four-year trial that included testimony from 115 witnesses, including Taylor himself—who testified in his defense for seven months—and celebrities such as British model Naomi Campbell and U.S. actress Mia Farrow, who the Prosecution called to show that Taylor knowingly handled blood diamonds. Taylor is the first head of state that an international or hybrid tribunal has convicted since the Nuremberg trials.

The following arbitral award was rendered by a sole arbitrator in connection with disputes reen the Libyan Arab Republic ("Libya") and two international oil companies arising out of rees of nationalization promulgated by Libya. This award is being reproduced herewith in entirety . The award not only considers many fundamental principles and doctrines of international law but is also unique in two major respects . For the first time in the history of international arbitration relating to economic development contracts , an arbitral tribunal held ; the injured parties were entitled to restitutio in integrum and that the sovereign s t a te obliged to perform specifically its contractual obligations with private foreign investors, iddition, the arbitral tribunal , after reviewing the legal effect in international law of the :ed Nations General Assembly resolutions concerning permanent sovereignty over natural wealth resources, concluded that such resolutions could not be used by the state to violate its :ractual obligations in commercial transactions . The remaining portion of this Introductory : will briefly describe the steps leading to arbitration , the arbitral proceedings and the ilution of the disputes.