Legal Framework

What is the legal Framework? Regulations

The Commercial Law Development Group within the Transitional Department of Trade and Industry is responsible for the preparation of Regulations and Administrative Orders to provide Kosovo with a workable body of law to enable its economy to function according to Western, free market principles.

So far four Regulations have been adopted, these are the regulations on Foreign Investment, Business Organisations, Contracts for the Sale of Goods and Pledges.

Foreign Investment

The purpose of this regulation is to put in place certain legal guarantees that are necessary to encourage foreign investment in Kosovo. The most important provisions in the regulation provide that:-

• Foreign investments will be governed by the principle of national treatment, meaning that they will be treated no less favourably than similar domestic enterprises;
• Foreign investments will be protected against unreasonable expropriations;
• Income from foreign investment may be freely transferred abroad and otherwise used in an unrestricted manner;
• Foreign Investments are protected against retroactive application of laws;
• Foreign investors have certain rights to employ foreign nationals.

The Business Organisations Regulation establishes the ways in which businesses can be organised and registered. The Pledge Regulation has been prepared in order to give Kosovo a modern law regulating all forms of secured transactions. Contracts for the Sale of Goods is a regulation that only covers sales law; it does not cover all areas of contract. It is based on the Vienna Sales Convention.

In the coming months it is expected that Regulations on Bankruptcy, Mortgage, Protection of Competition and Intellectual Property will be adopted.