THE NORD STREAMS: HOW TO HOLD THE EU MEMBER STATES ACCOUNTABLE FOR THE DAMAGE DONE

Amidst growing confrontation between Russia and the West, the good news is a number of rulings issued by international dispute resolution bodies in favor of the Russian Federation in 2024. The article underlines the necessity to maximize the use of a wide range of legal tools aimed at upholding the interests of Russia, its domestic business and related foreign companies. It is crucial to scrap a fragmented defensive strategy of mild situational reaction reduced to a passive response to certain hostile acts in favor of a holistic offensive strategy of legal struggle in every sphere. The Energy Charter Treaty (ECT) is one of such instruments. It provides for cross-border protection of capital investments of investors from some member states (including those associated with non-ECT countries) in the territories of other countries. The authors posit that the ECT can be practically applied to secure infrastructural energy investments in the Nord Streams destroyed by the explosion in the fall of 2022. It is particularly suitable for inducing the countries whose maritime spaces harbor the pipelines to reimburse the multi-billion-dollar material damage caused by the sabotage, as well as to disclose the information carefully concealed about the incident. The Treaty can also be employed as a lever for further negotiations on a package settlement of all the problems that have arisen between Russia and the West.

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