With the publication of this edition, The Review of the Kopaonik School of Natural Law completes four years of life in the realm of the juristic written word, having already built a library of several thousand pages. In the preceding period, The Review became widely known among the legal community and gained the favour and trust of academic circles. It is our responsibility today to stay on the course of development and continuous improvement of our scientific journal.

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This issue of The Review of the Kopaonik School of Natural Law features six scientific papers addressing court proceedings, arbitration and international sale of goods. From the viewpoint of the Hexagon of Natural Law, these papers, in terms of the subjects they are pursuing, belong to the Right to Property and the Right to Justice Departments of the Kopaonik School of Natural Law – Slobodan Perović.

The first section features an article by Prof. Dr Pilar Perales Viscasillas titled Litigation Risks in the Financial Sector and Climate Change (Rizici sudskih sporova u finansijskom sektoru i klimatske promene) which analyses different kinds of disputes in the financial sector related to climate change, and underlines the increased importance of litigation in order to change corporate behaviour.

The second section contains papers addressing arbitration.

Prof. Dr Alfredo Ferrante is the author of Breach of the Arbitration Agreement, Defaulting Defendant in Litigation and New York Convention’s Model Fluctuations: the Italian and Brazilian Examples (Povreda arbitražnog sporazuma, izostanak tuženog sa ročišta i fluktuacija modela Njujorške konvencije: italijanski i brazilski model). The paper aims to assess the effectiveness of an arbitration agreement when a plaintiff does not initiate arbitral proceedings, but rather the traditional court proceedings, above all in the case of the defendant failing to appear before the court and file its response in litigation. In order to address this and other issues, the author explores the relevant rules of New York Convention, and UNCITRAL Model Law on International Commercial Arbitration, as well as the Italian and Brazilian laws.

In their paper Cryptoassets and Arbitration in Serbia (Kripto-imovina i arbitraža u Srbiji), Milan Lazić and Srđan Dragićević analyse whether Serbia is suitable for digital asset disputes as a seat of arbitration and jurisdiction for recognition and enforcement of arbitral awards. The conclusion reached by the authors is that Serbia is indeed a suitable jurisdiction for both the arbitration procedure itself and the recognition and enforcement of arbitral awards, but that idiosyncrasies of the Serbian legal system, and particularly judiciary, and case law, give rise to certain issues.

David Wohlgemuth in his paper Selected Overview of Recent Swiss Case Law
in International Arbitration (Pogled na odabrane slučajeve novije švajcarske sudske prakse u oblasti međunarodne arbitraže) offers an in-depth examination of four selected issues that were subject of recent decisions of the Swiss Federal Tribunal in the context of international arbitration seated in Switzerland.

This issue of The Review also features two scientific papers as supplements.

The first supplement is paper Conflicts of Interest between Sharia and International Sale of Goods: Does CISG Interest Fit with Islamic Law? (Sukob interesa između šerijatskog prava i međunarodne prodaje robe: jesu li interesi Bečke konvencije usklađeni sa islamskim zakonom?), by Dr Lisa Spagnolo and Dr Maria Bhatti. The paper seeks to determine if the CISG rules on interest obligation may be reconciled with sharia law. It examines the basis for riba and gharar and considers in detail the interpretation of the CISG interest obligation. Based on their analysis, the authors conclude that the CISG and sharia may certainly be compatible if slight modifications to Opinion No. 14 of the CISG Advisory Council are to be adopted.

The paper Application of the CISG to International Government Contracts for the Procurement of Goods (Primena Bečke konvencije o međunarodnoj prodaji robe na međunarodne vladine ugovore o javnim nabavkama) by Cesar Pereira is featured as the second supplement to this edition. The paper examines the interaction between the CISG and public procurement regulations in light of the existing case law, current practice of certain national governments and international agencies, and numerous interpretations of the CISG and international public procurement models. The author addresses potential gains of adopting a uniform contract regulation of the CISG, as well as potential difficulties in public procurement proceedings when the CISG applies alongside domestic public procurement legislation.

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The editorial board voices the hope that the present, ninth edition of The Review of the Kopaonik School of Natural Law will meet the expectations of our readers and gives thanks to the authors who have contributed papers for this issue.

Prof. Dr Jelena S. Perović Vujačić
Editor-in-Chief