From 2014, not sure if still appliesAccording to section 90 of...

From 2014, not sure if still applies

According to section 90 of the Mineral Resources Act,

"A license may stipulate that a dispute between the Greenland Government and the licensee as to whether the terms of a licence have been complied with must be brought before a court of arbitration whose decision will be final."

Although the wording of section 90 may leave another impression, arbitration is not used as a means to solve all disputes between the Government of Greenland and the licensee regarding the license. Decisions, which according to the stipulations of the license depend on the judgment or resolve of the authorities, are not subject to arbitration, but such administrative decisions can be reviewed by the ordinary courts in accordance with section 63 of the Kingdom of Denmark's Constitution. This is expressly stated in the standard terms that form the basis of licenses issued by BMP.

These standard terms also contain an arbitration agreement, including a procedure for appointing an ad hoc arbitration tribunal (Standard Terms for Prospecting Licenses for Minerals, section 19, and Standard Terms for Exploration Licenses for Minerals, section 20). According to the standard terms:

the place of arbitration shall be Copenhagen,
Danish law shall be applied,
the arbitration tribunal shall consist of three arbitrators,
the Government of Greenland and the licensee each appoint one arbitrator and they jointly appoint the chairman of the arbitration tribunal,
the Chief Justice of the Danish Supreme Court will appoint the chairman if the parties cannot reach an agreement on the choice of chairman,
the arbitration tribunal makes its decision by a majority of votes, and
the arbitration tribunal will lay down its own rules of procedure.
Investors may prefer another place of arbitration or another method of electing the chairman, bearing in mind that arbitration in Denmark and a Danish chairman elected by the Chief Justice of the Danish Supreme Court could be considered as "home field" advantages for the Government of Greenland - although Danish judges are known to be fair and honourable.

On the other hand, there will most likely be no need for expert witness statements about Danish law.

One way of creating a more level playing field and at the same time saving costs is to agree on English as the language of the arbitration. The Standard Terms are silent on this matter, which means that Danish will most likely be the language of the arbitration, even if the license and all correspondence between the parties have been in English. If so, the language will be English in the Danish Arbitration Institute, whereas Danish will be the language before the Danish Construction Arbitration Board.