Document Type
Article
Publication Title
George Washington Law Review
Publication Date
12-2023
ISSN
0016-8076
Page Number
1616
Keywords
immunity, foreign official, Post-Samantar framework
Disciplines
Banking and Finance Law | Law
Abstract
Central bank assets held in foreign countries are entitled to immunity from execution under international law. Even as foreign sovereign immunity in general has become less absolute over time, the trend has been toward greater protection for foreign central bank assets. As countries expand their use of central banks, however, recent cases have limited immunity for certain kinds of sovereign wealth funds held by central banks. Sanctions on foreign central bank assets have also become more common, raising issues about the relation- ship between central bank immunity and the recognition of governments, the relationship between immunity and executive actions, and the denial of central bank immunity as a countermeasure. This symposium Article explores recent developments in central bank immunity focusing on sovereign wealth fund lit- igation in Sweden, U.S. sanctions on Afghan central bank assets, and the global response to sanctions imposed on Russian central banks following the invasion of Ukraine. Some of these actions and cases do not implicate foreign sovereign immunity. However, proposals to confiscate Russian central bank assets and U.S. litigation to turn Afghan central bank assets over to private plaintiffs, even if presented as countermeasures to secure reparations, would undermine signifi- cantly one of the increasingly rare areas of international economic law around which there is a global consensus: the immunity of foreign central banks from measures of execution.
Recommended Citation
Ingrid W. Brunk,
Central Bank Immunity, Sanctions, and Sovereign Wealth Funds, 91 George Washington Law Review. 1616
(2023)
Available at: https://scholarship.law.vanderbilt.edu/faculty-publications/1401