Resignation of Arbitrator in the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal

The Iran-United States Claims Tribunal, at the beginning of its formation as an arbitral tribunal (Article 2 of the Settlement Statement), adopted as its governing formal rules the UNCITRAL 1976 Commercial Arbitration Rules with amendments and changes. It is obvious that the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules, which were formulated and compiled to administer ad hoc arbitrations, could not be effective in their original form and without amendments and changes to administer multiple arbitrations in a large and continuous institutional arbitration such as the Iran-United States Claims Tribunal. Other characteristics of arbitration and arbitrators in this court, including the diversity, number of claims, the interest of governments and large corporations in these claims, the unfamiliarity of arbitration culture to Iranian arbitrators, and the cultural diversity of arbitrators, necessitated changes in the untested and relatively young rules at the time of the court’s establishment, i.e. in 1981, the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules adopted in 1976. Most authors who have written commentaries on the UNCITRAL Arbitration Rules or have written primarily on the procedure and procedures of arbitration have mainly used the experiences and procedures of the court. Therefore, in addition to the unparalleled role that the court has played in the substantive developments of international law, it has been a process-maker and influential in the procedural matters of international arbitration and even the judicial settlement of international disputes. In this article, we will discuss the reasons and effects of the addition of paragraph 5 to Article 13 of the UNCITRAL Rules regarding the arbitrator's obligation to continue the proceedings after his resignation becomes effective in cases in which he has previously participated in the substantive hearing. We will discuss the reasons for the establishment of this rule (known as the Mask rule) and its legal effects in light of the general rules governing the resignation and replacement of arbitrators, its effects on the rights of the litigants, the necessity of a fair and just hearing, and the preservation of the integrity, legitimacy, and credibility of the arbitration.