'III. Arbitral proceedings to date

. . . . . . . . .

16. The Terms of Reference were, after consultation with the Parties, submitted for signature by letter of the arbitrator dated 24 January 2001.

17. On 27 February 2001 counsel for Claimant sent a letter stating that certain agreed amendments had erroneously not been inserted in the text of the Terms of Reference as sent for signature.

18. On 2 March 2001 the sole arbitrator wrote to the Parties confirming that erroneously the relevant amendments had not been inserted and enclosed corrected copies of the Terms of Reference containing the text as it had been agreed on with the Parties in January 2001, for signature.

19. The Terms of Reference, in final form, signed on behalf of each of the Parties and by the sole arbitrator, were sent by the arbitrator to the International Court of Arbitration on 11 May 2001.

20. By letter of 20 April 2001 counsel for Claimant submitted a request under Article 19 of the ICC Rules of Arbitration to extend the amount in dispute from . . ., as was stated in the Request, to . . . as was stated in the Statement of Claim.

21. By letter of 4 May 2001 counsel for Respondent demanded that this latter request be rejected.

22. By an Order dated 15 May 2001 the Arbitral Tribunal authorised the increase of the amount in dispute to . . .

. . . . . . . . . .

V. Ruling on the Level of Interest

28. Initially in the Request the claim for interest over the sums due was for 5%. This was based on the level of interest that would be due under German law. Subsequently the parties agreed that Belgian law would have to be applied on the claim of [Claimant] (Terms of Reference, under IX "The parties agree that the applicable law will be Belgian law"). As was stated unanimously by both parties and their counsel, under Belgian law legal interest is set at 7%. In the Statement of Claim therefore, and in the Supplementary Statement of Claim, the rate of interest claimed is at 7%.

29. Respondent . . . is opposed to allowing [Claimant] to raise the interest claimed from 5% as in the Request, to 7%.

30. Since technically the increase in interest as claimed can be considered to be a "new claim" the Arbitral Tribunal will, under Article 19 of the Rules of Arbitration, have to decide whether this increase in interest can be allowed.

31. The reason for changing the interest level from 5% to 7% is clear: [Claimant] initially assumed that German law would apply on the contractual relationship. This would lead to an interest rate of 5%. However, when the parties agreed that Belgian law was to apply, [Claimant] started applying the Belgian rate of legal interest which is 7%.

32. [Respondent] opposes the increase of the interest level from 5% to 7% stating, briefly summarised, that there is no reason to deviate from the claim as it was originally instituted by [Claimant].

33. The Arbitral Tribunal rules that the application of a 7% interest level can be, and is hereby, allowed.

Allowing this "new claim", which was introduced by [Claimant] at a very early stage of the proceedings, does not put an extra burden on the defence and it is the logical consequence from the shift to application of Belgian law.'