7 King's Bench Walk

Jawdat specialises in all aspects of commercial litigation and arbitration, with a particular prominence in insurance and reinsurance disputes, where he has long been acknowledged as a leading practitioner at the bar.

As part of a broad commercial litigation and arbitration practice, Jawdat acts as an advocate and as an adviser in a wide range of commercial disputes, many of which are complex and have an international element.  In addition to insurance and reinsurance matters, Jawdat is regularly engaged in matters in the fields of shipping and commodities, commercial fraud, energy and natural resources, banking and finance, and sanctions.

Jawdat is currently engaged on behalf of members of the War Risks insurance market in AerCap Ireland Limited v AIG Europe S.A. and Lloyd’s Insurance Company S.A. and in other leading cases concerned with the alleged loss of aircraft and engines leased to Russian airlines following the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the subsequent imposition of Western sanctions against Russia.  Other current instructions include arbitrations concerned with claims under policies of political violence insurance and trade credit insurance, and with the operation of a container terminal.

Recent cases include Quadra Commodities S.A. v XL Insurance Company SE [2023] EWCA Civ 432 (CA) (a case arising out of the Agroinvestgroup fraud concerned with the question whether an insured who had paid the purchase price had an insurable interest in unascertained goods); CRF I Limited v Banco Nacional de Cuba and the Republic of Cuba [2023] EWHC 774 (Comm) (a challenge by the former central bank of Cuba to the jurisdiction of the English Court to determine a creditor’s claim to enforce historic Cuban sovereign debt); McPhee v Colina Insurance Limited [2023] UKPC 8 (PC) (an appeal from the Court of Appeal of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council concerned with the operation of ‘universal life’ insurance policies); Aramco Trading Fujairah FZE v Gulf Petrochem FZC (“The Kronviken”) [2022] EWHC 57 (Comm) (a case arising out of the Gulf Petrochem fraud in which a buyer of fuel oil, who paid against a letter of indemnity in the absence of the bills of lading, obtained a mandatory injunction against the seller); Harcus Sinclair LLP v Your Lawyers Limited [2021] UKSC 32 (SC) (a case before the Supreme Court concerned with the question whether a restriction in a non-disclosure agreement signed in connection with the Volkswagen diesel emissions scandal constituted a solicitor’s undertaking enforceable by the Court pursuant to its inherent supervisory jurisdiction over solicitors).

Called 1994; Silk 2018

COMBAR; LCLCBA; BILA; LSLC; supporting member of the LMAA.

Cranleigh School; St. Catherine’s College, Oxford.