Parallel Universes of Investment Protection? A Divergent Finding on the Definition of Investment in the icsid Arbitration on Greek Sovereign Debts

As exemplified by the three icsid cases brought by Italian bondholders against Argentina, arbitral tribunals have tended to interpret broadly the term ‘investment’ in applicable bits. However, the tribunal in Poštová banka v. Greece came to the opposite conclusion: the series of Greek sovereign bonds in question did not constitute a protected ‘investment’. Although the tribunal carefully scrutinized the specificity in phrasing in the applicable bits so as to justify its divergent conclusion, some commentators still find inconsistencies with previous jurisprudence. This article examines the interpretative approach taken by the Poštová tribunal and compares it to previous jurisprudence involving disputes over Argentine sovereign bonds, by employing the concept of a two-level judicial dialogue: dialogue on treaty languages and dialogue on an interpretative assumption. It will explain both the apparent consistency between the two lines of jurisprudence as well as the divergence in their interpretative approaches.

SarS, a SarA Homolog Repressible by agr, Is an Activator of Protein A Synthesis in Staphylococcus aureus

ABSTRACT The expression of protein A (spa) is repressed by global regulatory loci sarA and agr. Although SarA may directly bind to the spa promoter to downregulatespa expression, the mechanism by which agrrepresses spa expression is not clearly understood. In searching for SarA homologs in the partially released genome, we found a SarA homolog, encoding a 250-amino-acid protein designated SarS, upstream of the spa gene. The expression ofsarS was almost undetectable in parental strain RN6390 but was highly expressed in agr and sarA mutants, strains normally expressing high level of protein A. Interestingly, protein A expression was decreased in a sarS mutant as detected in an immunoblot but returned to near-parental levels in a complemented sarS mutant. Transcriptional fusion studies with a 158- and a 491-bp spa promoter fragment linked to the xylE reporter gene disclosed that the transcription of the spa promoter was also downregulated in thesarS mutant compared with the parental strain. Interestingly, the enhancement in spa expression in anagr mutant returned to a near-parental level in theagr sarS double mutant but not in the sarA sarSdouble mutant. Correlating with this divergent finding is the observation that enhanced sarS expression in anagr mutant was repressed by the sarA locus supplied in trans but not in a sarA mutant expressing RNAIII from a plasmid. Gel shift studies also revealed the specific binding of SarS to the 158-bp spa promoter. Taken together, these data indicated that the agr locus probably mediates spa repression by suppressing the transcription ofsarS, an activator of spa expression. However, the pathway by which the sarA locus downregulatesspa expression is sarS independent.