Russia has appointed former Chief Justice of India (CJI) D Y Chandrachud as its arbitrator in an investment treaty dispute brought by Ukrainian state-owned bank Oschadbank. According to reports from Bar and Bench, the proceedings have been initiated under a 1998 bilateral investment treaty signed between Ukraine and Russia. Costa Rican arbitrator and former trade minister Dyalá Jiménez, who was jointly selected by both sides, will lead the three-member tribunal, while Greek arbitrator Stavros Brekoulakis, professor at the National University of Singapore, serves as the third member appointed by Oschadbank.
Oschadbank's claim concerns assets and operations in the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions that it allegedly lost following Russia's military actions in Ukraine, particularly after the full-scale invasion in 2022. As reported by Bar and Bench, the bank has stated it suffered the loss of substantial assets and the ability to continue business operations following Russia's full-scale invasion that began in February 2022. The bank described these as seized or lost banking assets and investments in the temporarily occupied or affected territories of those four regions, which forced it to suspend operations there. The claim is reportedly worth hundreds of millions of dollars and was initiated by Oschadbank after it served a notice of dispute to Russia in July 2025, which allegedly went unanswered. The arbitration proceedings are being conducted under the investment treaty framework between the two countries, which allows investors to seek arbitration over certain disputes concerning investments.
Chandrachud had previously declined approaches from Russia to serve as its arbitrator in treaty disputes involving German energy company Wintershall Dea and Ukrainian state energy company Ukrenergo. According to reports from Bar and Bench, the approaches were reportedly made on the same day that the Permanent Court of Arbitration designated him as the appointing authority in the Wintershall proceedings. He later stepped down from that role after disclosing the communications from Russia. This appointment as Russia's arbitrator in the Oschadbank case therefore marks a change from his earlier decision not to accept Russia's approaches in those proceedings.
Both sides have assembled serious legal firepower for the case. Oschadbank is represented by Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan partners Epaminontas Triantafilou and Alex Gerbi, working alongside Asters partners Oleksiy Didkovskiy, Andrii Pozhidayev and Oksana Legka. Russia's defense rests with Pinna Goldberg partner Andrea Pinna, along with counsel Pratyush Panjwani and senior associate Dimitrios Papageorgiou. The arbitration has been initiated under the 1998 bilateral investment treaty between Ukraine and Russia, a decades-old agreement now being tested by a war that treaty's drafters likely never imagined.
