When treaty shields collide with an asset recovery crusade

The S Alam Group owner, Mohammad Saiful Alam, has recently taken Bangladesh to the arbitration arm of the World Bank under the 2004 Bangladesh-Singapore bilateral investment treaty (BIT).

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The arbitration request lodged by his lawyers alleges that Bangladesh's asset recovery drive has cost his family business "hundreds of millions" of dollars following what he callsa"targeted campaign" of asset freezes, confiscations, and investigations by the interim government.

This development cannot be taken lightly. It directly tests how an anti-corruption drive meets the hard law of investor protection, and the outcome may send powerful signals to investors. The 2004 Bangladesh-Singapore treaty defines an investor as a citizen of a contracting state and offers guarantees including fair and equitable treatment, full protection and security, free transfer of capital, and compensation for expropriation. It also allows an investor to start a case at the World Bank's International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) after a six-month cooling-off period.