Successive governments in France have long considered the mechanism of settlement of disputes between investors and states (RDIE or ISDS in English) as a useful instrument for French companies abroad and harmless for France. Statistics on known cases of disputes have long validated this reading for a long time: 68 cases of disputes between French investors and third countries (notably Argentina, Hungary, Mexico, Peru, Egypt, India, Poland and Senegal for almost half of the total) against only four procedures against the French State.
The wheel turns a little
But the wheel could be turning. France is now the target of foreign investors who attack it before private investment arbitration courts. For the two most recent cases of known disputes, they are even Russian oligarchs under sanctions that are maneuvering.
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In the case Severgroup et KN Holdings c Francetwo Russian holdings attack the French State, demanding more than $ 4.5 billion in compensation following the abandonment of the “gold mountain” mining project in Guyana, even though the French courts have confirmed the legality of the refusal of granting the concession for environmental reasons. In addition, a Russian-Armenian oligarch attacks France directly, via the agreement between France and Armenia, for the seizure of its villa on the Côte d’Azur as well as other assets.
France had however been a pioneer at the time of the modernization of the Treaty on the Charter of Energy (TCE) by withdrawing from 2022, followed by nine other States and the European Union (EU) of this multilateral treaty, the most invoked in disputes, in particular by investors in the fossil fuels. However, it still has 90 protection agreements of its investments with a dispute settlement mechanism between investors and states, including 84 in force, as revealed by a new study by the Veblen Institute.
However, these agreements, which today benefit mainly from French companies, present exactly the same faults as the TCE. They are not compatible with commitments and EU law, in particular:
- With article 2.1.c of the Paris Agreement which provides for an alignment of financial flows with the climatic objectives of the parties insofar as they protect fossil investments,
- With the 1/17 CJEU opinion on CETA, the trade agreement between the EU and Canada which defined compatibility criteria completely absent from the older investment agreements,
- With the resolution of the European Parliament on the future of EU policy on international investments adopted in June 2022.
Indeed, these agreements protect investments, especially French abroad, including “Fossil investments and other investments harmful to the environment, climate and human rights”. They contain survival clauses (investment protections continue to apply even when you get out), do not restrict protection standards for discrimination, denial of access to justice, or direct expropriation. Or they do not provide for a cap of compensation at the cost level actually incurred by investors.
Some agreements of the French network, inherited from the decolonization period, prove to be particularly obsolete
Certain French network agreements, inherited from the decolonization period, prove to be particularly obsolete. Those with Serbia and Montenegro (from the France Yugoslavia Treaty in 1974) are not reciprocal (they protect French investments in these countries but not vice versa).
They contain a stabilization clause which guarantees French investors a protection against national regulatory developments and an unlimited survival clause which provides that the provisions will remain applicable even after denunciation of the agreement. Unlimited survival clauses in time are also inscribed in the agreements with Indonesia (denounced by the latter), Egypt and South Korea.
Agreements that protect fossils
And a large part of these agreements are retroactive, insofar as they offer protection including investments made before their signature.
In 2024, a study led by E3G had shown that France is the third country whose investment treaty network protects the most fossil emissions
In 2024, a study conducted by E3G had shown that France is the third country whose network of investment treaties protects the most fossil emissions (around 188 mt co2 In progress and potential, or 9.4 % of total fossil emissions protected by investment treaties worldwide). After the Treaty on the Energy Charter, from which France was released in 2023, came to the lead the bilateral investment treaties with the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, China, Nigeria, Iraq, Mozambique, Kazakhstan, Libya, Argentina, Namibia and Russia.
In 2022 and 2025, IPCC and IPBES identified investment protection treaties as an obstacle to the implementation of ambitious public policies in terms of climate and biodiversity. The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and the Environment, David R. Boyd, has called states to end unilaterally or jointly in conjunction of international investment treaties which contain a mechanism of settlement of disputes between investors and states, in a report of 2023 alerting on the explosion of cases of the RDIE filed by fossil investors using the investment treaties, in particular TCE.
An appeal repeated by the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Climate Change, Elisa Morgera, in 2025.
Denounce the agreements
To reduce the risk of disputes that slow down or add action in favor of ecological and social transition, the most effective path would be to denounce these agreements
To reduce the risk of disputes that slow down or add action in favor of ecological and social transition, the most effective path would be to denounce these agreements. In parallel with the exit of the TCE, France has already ended in a concerted manner with the other EU countries to twelve protection agreements of intra European investments. An immediate denunciation would be possible for 76 agreements of its remaining stock, the duration of which initially planned has reached due date, starting with that between France and Russia.
For the others, the government should plan to denounce them as the current deadlines are achieved. In the absence of action on the part of France, the European Commission would also be in a position to ask it, as well as to the other member states, to put an end to the former agreements.
If the fact that these agreements preclude ecological transition is no longer a sufficiently mobilizing argument for certain decision -makers, the instrumentalization of these treaties by Russian oligarchs under sanctions and the risk of having to mobilize taxpayer’s money to pay them compensations should be enough to challenge them!
