## Facts

- A Danish buyer (award creditor) and a German seller (award debtor) entered into a sales contract that included an arbitration clause.
- A dispute arose and was submitted to the Copenhagen Arbitration Committee for Grain and Feed Stuff Trade.
- The parties received a list of potential arbitrators, but they were not notified which arbitrators were actually appointed to decide their dispute.
- The arbitral tribunal issued an award in favor of the Danish buyer.
- The award did not disclose the identity of the arbitrators who decided the case.
- To obtain recognition and enforcement in Germany, the Danish buyer submitted a copy of the award that did not contain the arbitrators’ signatures.
- A German court of first instance refused enforcement, reasoning that the parties had not been informed of the arbitrators’ identities.
- The Danish buyer appealed to the German Court of Appeal in Cologne (Oberlandesgericht Köln).

## Issues

1. Whether recognition and enforcement may be refused under the New York Convention where the parties were not given notice of which arbitrators were appointed and the award itself did not identify the arbitrators.
2. Whether the applicant’s submission of an unsigned copy of the award is sufficient proof for enforcement, or instead supports refusal (or non-enforcement as filed) because the court cannot verify the award’s authenticity and issuance by the appointed tribunal.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeal in Cologne upheld the refusal to enforce the award.
- The court treated the failure to inform the parties which arbitrators were appointed—together with an award that did not name the arbitrators—as a procedural defect affecting the parties’ ability to react to the tribunal’s composition.
- The court also relied on the fact that the copy of the award submitted for enforcement lacked the arbitrators’ signatures, which prevented the court from reliably confirming the award’s authenticity and regularity for enforcement purposes.
- Recognition and enforcement were denied on the record presented in the German proceedings.

## Legal Principles

- Under New York Convention Article V(1)(b), enforcement may be refused if the party against whom the award is invoked was not given proper notice of the appointment of the arbitrator(s) or was otherwise unable to present its case.
- “Notice of appointment” is not limited to awareness that arbitration is pending; it includes information that allows a party to know who will decide the dispute so it can exercise procedural rights related to tribunal composition where available.
- An award that does not identify the arbitrators, especially when paired with an unsigned copy submitted for enforcement, can prevent an enforcing court from verifying that the award was rendered by the duly constituted decision-makers.
- The applicant for enforcement must present the award in a form that permits verification of authenticity under the Convention’s enforcement process; deficiencies in the proof offered may justify denial of enforcement as submitted.

## Conclusion

In *Danish Buyer v. German Seller*, the German courts declined to enforce a Copenhagen Arbitration Committee award after concluding that the parties were not informed which arbitrators were appointed and the award did not identify the arbitrators; the enforcement request also relied on an unsigned copy of the award, leaving the court unable to confirm that an identifiable, properly appointed tribunal had rendered an authentic award suitable for enforcement under the New York Convention.


Danish Buyer v. German Seller, 4 Y.B. Comm. Arb. 258 (1979)