Ulrich Schroeter

Institution: University of Basel

Period of stay: 22 September until 19 December 2025

Contact: ulrich.schroeter@unibas.ch

www.ulrichschroeter.com

Profile: 

Ulrich Schroeter is Professor of Law at the University of Basel (Switzerland). He has published extensively on matters of international trade law, treaty law, commercial law, contract law, arbitration, European Union law and financial markets regulation. In his research, he has dealt with various aspects of the public international law and regulatory framework for cross-border commercial transactions. Insofar, he has inter alia written on treaty law and other public international questions relating to uniform commercial law-making conventions (reservations, effects of State successions, status of territorial units etc.), on the regulation of cross-border supply chains and on the effect of economic sanctions on international contractual relationships.

Professor Schroeter’s works have been cited by courts in Australia, Austria, Germany, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Switzerland and the United States of America, as well as by Advocates General at the European Court of Justice. He is an elected member of the Council of the European Law Institute (ELI) and serves as national correspondent for Switzerland to the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL).

Prior to taking up his position in Basel in 2017, Ulrich was professor of law at the University of Mannheim (Germany) (2012–2017). He holds a Doctor iuris from the Freie Universität Berlin.

Research Area:

Economic Sanctions

Research Title:

The legality of secondary sanctions under public international law

Research Outline:

Economic sanctions are instruments with a long history in international relations. Their original type are “primary” sanctions, understood as prohibitions to deal with a sanctioned State that are addressed by the sanctioning State at individuals and companies within its territory or of its nationality. By contrast, “secondary” sanctions are addressed by the sanctioning State at individuals and companies in third States or of a third State’s nationality, providing such sanctions with an extraterritorial effect.

In my project, I investigate what limits, if any, are imposed by public international law on the making of secondary sanctions and on their enforcement. In this respect, I first address recognized public international law concepts regarding States’ jurisdiction, notably territoriality. Their application to secondary sanctions is far from clear: How can the traditional territoriality/extraterritoriality dichotomy be applied to prohibitions concerning modern markets like the US-dollar currency market, global payment systems (SWIFT) or financial market systems that are increasingly not located “in” a particular State, but can be accessed from anywhere in the world? Can the notion of territoriality justify “technology-based” secondary sanctions, which prohibit the reexportation from a third country, directly or indirectly, of goods containing technology that had originally been exported from the sanctioning State? Is there a need and room for novel standards and criteria to limit secondary sanctions with extraterritorial effects?

Second, limitations for secondary sanctions following from the WTO Agreement and other treaties governing international commercial activity will be scrutinised, with a focus on the “security exceptions” in such treaties.

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