Arbitration in Armenia: from agreement to execution

Statute, seat and the two models

The principal source is Armenia’s Commercial Arbitration Law HO-55-N. Article 2 covers both permanent institutions and tribunals formed for a particular dispute. Russia’s authorised-institution status is not the local test. Begin with the claims, legal seat and parties: an arbitration clause does not remove arbitrability restrictions. Articles 20 and 31 connect the seat with the award while permitting particular activities elsewhere.

Armenia’s Civil Procedure Code, particularly Chapters 45–48, governs applications to state courts and their examination of arbitration-related matters. The consolidation includes transitional notes on electronic submission for execution; the date of the particular procedural step and the relevant amendment’s commencement conditions require separate attention.

Agreement and tribunal formation

Article 7 recognises a written clause or separate agreement, electronic exchanges, an agreement acknowledged through exchanged pleadings, and incorporation by reference. The reference must make the clause part of the contract. Specify the institution or ad hoc model, seat, language, number of arbitrators and fallback appointment mechanism. These choices reduce organisational uncertainty without guaranteeing eventual enforcement.

Articles 11–15 govern appointment, challenge and replacement. The statute sets local qualifications, including age 25 and higher education. An agreed procedure operates first; specified appointment failures permit a court application. Without an agreed challenge procedure, a written challenge to the tribunal is due within 15 days after the relevant knowledge; a rejected challenge permits a court application within 30 days. The application does not invariably stop the arbitration.

Which court assists and supervises

Article 6 divides functions. The court at the seat handles the specified appointment, challenge, mandate-termination, interim-relief and evidence questions. Jurisdiction review under Article 16(3), setting aside and functions under Articles 35–36.2 belong to the Yerevan first-instance general-jurisdiction civil court. A former court name in an older translation should not be copied into a current application.

Code Articles 332–335 prescribe the assistance application and its supporting documents. The requested intervention needs a specific statutory basis. A party seeking evidentiary assistance must supply the tribunal’s approval. Assistance and award review address different questions; a general request to help the arbitration does not replace a defined procedural application.

Evidence and interim measures

Article 27 permits the tribunal, or a party with its approval, to seek documents, witness attendance and other assistance in obtaining evidence. It contains no institutional restriction comparable to Russia’s ad hoc exclusion. The court acts within its own jurisdiction. Tribunal approval neither gives every foreign court jurisdiction nor displaces rules protecting confidential information or governing the requested step.

Article 9 permits court interim relief before or during arbitration; Article 17 governs tribunal measures. Statutory Chapter 8.1 separately addresses recognition and enforcement of interim orders. A court attachment, an arbitral order and its later compulsory implementation therefore need separate treatment: their authority and implementation routes differ.

Setting aside: grounds, periods and court proceedings

Article 34 covers incapacity or invalid agreement, defective notice or inability to present a case, excess of mandate, and improper constitution or procedure; the court also examines arbitrability and public policy. This is limited review, not a fresh debt trial. A party’s general period is three months from receipt; an Article 33 request for correction, interpretation or an additional award changes the starting point under Article 34(3).

For a person whose rights or obligations were determined, Code Article 316(3) supplies a special one-month period from knowledge of the award. Article 318 provides written examination and joinder of related setting-aside and enforcement applications. The Court of Cassation’s 2024 decision separately explains the absence of an appeal route for the setting-aside order considered there. An ordinary sequence of appeals cannot be promised for every supervisory order.

Execution: court proceedings and the institutional exception

Law Articles 35–36 govern recognition, documents and refusal. A foreign award additionally requires attention to the applicable treaty, translation and Code Chapter 47. The general application periods in Code Articles 321(4) and 326(4) differ: one year from receipt for a domestic award and three years from a foreign award’s entry into force. Article 327(3) distinguishes certification of copies by a permanent institution from notarial certification for ad hoc awards. Neither period replaces the setting-aside deadline. The 2016 case concerning notice in the state court illustrates the opportunity to oppose enforcement.

Article 35(4) and Articles 35.1–35.4 allow an institution to send an award directly to the execution service where all conditions coincide: a permanent institution, an Armenian seat, only Armenian citizens or locally registered legal entities, and an amount within the statutory threshold of 5,000 minimum salaries. The monetary calculation requires checking the applicable calculation rules; multiplying by the actual wage is unreliable. The institution application is made within one year of receipt, but not before three months; a court route applies if the institution has ceased operating.

An ad hoc award does not itself qualify for this institutional mechanism. A pending setting-aside application affects the institution’s consideration; Article 35.4(4) provides specific consequences after submission for execution and an exception for obstacles beyond the applicant’s control. Permission to execute still leaves actual recovery: the 2025 case about a share in real estate illustrates a separate dispute at that stage and the importance of its dissent.

Financial consumers: a special agreement rule

Article 8(3) of the Commercial Arbitration Law separately protects individual consumers of financial services. A pre-dispute clause in the relevant contract does not remove their right to sue. The exception concerns an agreement after the dispute arose and unconditional consent to arbitration. In Gevorgyan v Ardshinbank, cassation preserved remittal of the claim. Written form and the ability to invoke the agreement against a consumer are therefore separate questions.

After execution is authorised: receipt and presentation

In Unibank’s case of12January2022, cassation itself restored the period for presenting arbitral writs because the court file lacked proper dispatch and receipt evidence. The case applied the pre-1April2018 statutory edition. Current periods and transitions require separate examination; the practical need to document issue, receipt and submission for execution remains relevant.

What must be agreed and what the statute supplies

Article 7 requires written consent concerning all or specified disputes from an identified relationship. Seat, language and number are not a separate list of mandatory elements. Without agreement Article 10 supplies three; Articles 20 and22 leave seat and language to the tribunal. Article 19(2) refers to relevant Armenian Code procedures where no procedure is agreed. Institutional rules need their own examination: AMCA’s general number rule differs from the statutory discretionary default.

Parties choose merits law under Article 28; otherwise the statutory mechanism applies. With an Armenian seat and an Armenian citizen or locally registered entity among the parties, Article 28(2.1) directs Armenian law absent choice. Agreement law is separate: at annulment Article 34(2)(1)(a) tests validity under chosen law, otherwise Armenian law. These provisions should not be collapsed into one assertion that contract law governs every question.

An evidence request: deadline and application contents

Court assistance under Law Article 27 must also satisfy Code Article 332(3): the general filing period is one month from actual or constructive knowledge of the circumstances supporting the application, unless the arbitration statute or agreement provides another period. It is the time for requesting that assistance, rather than the duration of the arbitration.

Code Article 333(4)–(8) specifies the person who must produce documents, the recipient, the documents, evidence and form of assistance sought; a witness-attendance request identifies the witness and address. A party attaches tribunal approval. Evidence of the arbitration’s procedural stage, the agreement and the court fee are also addressed, with express exceptions for preliminary measures and service of the application. An unspecified request for everything relating to a transaction does not supply these particulars.

Article 334 distinguishes decision periods: the specified interim-relief, production and evidence-assistance requests are decided without a hearing no later than the day after receipt; appointment applications are decided without a hearing within 15 days. Other applications follow the general one-month procedure. These are periods for deciding the request, not guarantees of actual document delivery or recovery within that time.

The tribunal’s expert and party experts

Under Article 26, unless otherwise agreed, the tribunal can appoint one or more experts on specified questions and require a party to provide information, documents, goods or access for examination. Appointment does not turn the expert into an arbitrator: paragraph 3 requires the tribunal itself to assess the opinion.

After giving a written or oral opinion, the expert must attend a hearing where a party requests it or the tribunal considers it necessary, unless otherwise agreed under paragraph 2. Parties can ask questions and present expert witnesses on disputed issues. A procedural direction can specify the source materials, access, questions, deadline, payment and treatment of conflicting opinions. This permits scrutiny of methods and conclusions before the award.

Enforcing an interim measure requires a separate application

Article 36.1 permits recognition and enforcement of an interim measure ordered by the tribunal. The applicant must promptly inform the court if the measure is terminated, suspended or modified; the court can require security in the specified circumstances. Article 1(3) includes Articles 36.1–36.2 among the exceptions to the statute’s general Armenian-seat limitation.

Article 36.2 separately lists refusal grounds: the applicable agreement, notice, jurisdiction or procedural defects; non-compliance with tribunal-ordered security; termination or suspension of the measure; incompatibility with the court’s powers; non-arbitrability and public policy. The court may adapt the measure to its procedure without changing its substance. Its decision concerns recognition and enforcement, rather than a fresh merits examination of the interim measure.

Annulment and execution: the sequence matters

Under Code Article 316(4), execution is suspended once the annulment application is accepted for proceedings, until the resulting final judicial act takes legal effect. Merely sending an application is not acceptance. Keep the acceptance decision with communications to the execution authority.

Related annulment and execution applications are joined under Articles 318 and 323. Article 323(7) limits a subsequent annulment application after the award has been submitted for compulsory execution. The exception requires showing that an application during the execution-submission proceedings was impossible for reasons beyond the applicant’s control. Law Article 35.4(4) separately provides a similar rule for direct institutional submission. Objections and annulment relief should therefore be raised in time, without waiting for the execution authority’s first recovery step.