Newsletter-21

195 ARBITRATION LAW Additionally, the request shall contain a statement as to how the documents are relevant to the case and material to its outcome. In this provision, relevance and materiality of the documents sought is impor- tant, and may be a reason to object to document production requests. Finally, the document production request shall contain a statement that the documents are not in the possession, custody or control of the requesting party, or a statement concerning the reasons why it would be unreasonably burdensome for the requesting party to produce such documents, and a statement explaining why the requesting party as- sumes that the requested documents are in the possession, custody, or control of another party. Procedure concerning the Objections to Document Production Requests The party to whom the document production request is addressed may object to the request, pursuant to Art. 3.5 of the IBA Rules. Ac- cordingly, the objection shall be made in writing to the arbitral tribunal and the other parties within the time ordered by the arbitral tribunal. The reasons for objection may be the failure to meet the condi- tions laid down under Art. 3.3, or based on the grounds set forth under Art. 9.2 of the Rules 4 . In the event that there is such objection, the arbitral tribunal may invite the parties to consult with each other to resolve the objection. In the event that the objections are not resolved between the parties, either party may request the arbitral tribunal to rule on the objection. In this case, the arbitral tribunal shall consider the requests to produce, as well as the objection. The arbitral tribunal, in this con- sideration, decides whether the issues that the requesting party wishes to prove are relevant to the case and material to its outcome, whether the grounds for objection laid down under Art. 9.2 apply, and whether the requirements detailed under Art. 3.3 have been satisfied. Upon this review, the arbitral tribunal shall order that the docu- ments within the scope of the document production request shall be 4 These grounds shall be analyzed in our next article.