As part of the US government’s efforts to support Iraq’s nascent commercial courts, CLDP held a workshop for 20 Iraqi judges in Erbil, Iraq from March 19-22.  The workshop was led by Federal Judge Delissa Ridgway of the U.S. Court of International Trade and focused on adjudicating disputes arising from international sales contracts. The Iraqi participants were primarily first instance court judges who represented over thirteen Iraqi provinces in addition to two commercial court judges from Baghdad and Basra.
 
Due to an increasing number of disputes arising from contracts between government ministries and foreign suppliers, the Iraqi judiciary has specifically requested specialized training for its trial court judges in the area of international sales contracts. Iraqi government institutions, specifically those tasked with service delivery, often complain of foreign companies failing to deliver goods and services or delivering incomplete or expired goods.  These failures stem largely from their limited capacities to draft and negotiate durable sales contracts in addition to a lack of legal awareness of their rights and recourse to recover funds.
The workshop provided the Iraqi judges with a rare opportunity to learn about the applicable international conventions and best practices to resolve these disputes including the Convention on the International Sale of Goods (CISG) and the UNIDROIT principles. The contributions of the Iraqi commercial court judges, an Iraqi law professor and the focus on case study exercises were all cited as key factors by the Iraqi participants in the success of the program.
 
The international sales workshop represents the fifth in-country workshop in a multi-phase program to train judges on complex commercial transactions and how to effectively adjudicate the disputes arising from these transactions.