Dubai International Arbitration Centre’s Default Seat of Arbitration

Last year, DIAC released a draft set of new rules, the DIAC Arbitration and Conciliation Rules 2016 (the “DIAC Rules 2016”) for public consultation and it has recently indicated that the revisions to its rules will include a change to the default seat of arbitration from the ‘onshore’ Dubai to the ‘offshore’ Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC). Here Claire Miller and Komal Fayyaz discuss the impact of the proposed change.