We have successfully conquered the Corona pandemic, and healthily survived with zero infection thereof.  Therefore, we, from the bottom of our heart, feel grateful for the traditional Chinese medicine, grateful for the holy bestowal, blessing and protection from and by our Chinese ancestors, grateful that the Chinese communists with the General Secretary Jinping Xi as the representative thereof, with all having one heart, are leading the Chinese people, upholding “life being supreme and people being supreme”, serving the people wholeheartedly, thus having saved countless lives, leading and founding the community of human destiny, guiding and leading the Chinese people into the solid road of rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.

We have lost close relatives and good friends during the three-year pandemic.  Until now we have been able to gradually soothe our broken hearts, save and gather enough strength and spirit, and compose such short essays, expressing our mourning with deep grief.  Our client and friend Mr. Luc van den Kieboom suddenly passed away in Belgium on January 31, 2022.  Deric brought us this grievous news per wechat, making my colleague Linda and me myself suddenly fall into infinite sorrow and grief.  We feel deep regret about Luc's sudden death at such young age in his prime, and we grieve over our losing Luc forever, our Belgian client and friend with high morals of dignity, integrity and reliability.

Our relationship with Luc from client to friend started in the period from December, 2006 to June, 2008, in which we had won the arbitration case in CIETAC for Luc’s Belgian company, by which we had successfully recovered million Yuan project payment for Luc’s Belgian company, and successfully made his Belgian company exempt from million Yuan counter-claim.  Then, we just returned from our study in Germany shortly, and it should be the case that, with the divine providence having eyes over us and with the blessing from and by Buddha, Luc and Deric found us first by internet and decided to retain us for the case immediately upon the first meeting.  Luc’s Belgian company signed one US-version plant decoration project contract in English, which was extremely unfavorable to itself, with one large US machinery manufacturing company in Tianjin development zone, completely finished the plant decoration project under the strict supervision by one Australian supervision company, which was extremely unfriendly to the construction workers, and then was refused to get paid for most of the project payment on the grounds that the project did not meet the required standards.

Confronted with that complex US-version plant decoration project contract, which was 100% extremely unfavorable to our party (the applicant) and 100% favorable to the US landlord (the respondent), and which had been signed and completely performed, the hope for arbitration claim of our party for the project payment appeared very slim, while the US landlord raised the large sum of counter-claim against our party.  Fortunately enough, Luc had provided my colleague Linda and me myself with the complete detailed project record in written form, thus laying solid foundation for the factual evidential documentations on the case.  We had studied the whole case details round the clock, penetrated the US-version project contract in English, and finally found the key case breakthrough after a dozen of day-night struggles, and Luc and Deric had also accompanied our struggles day and night.  At that time, for the sake of saving the attorney fees for Luc’s Belgian company, we had let them find outside translation companies to translate the case evidential documentations, yet what we had received in return was the work mostly done by machine translation and could not be used at all, and we had had to do the translation in person by ourselves.

Luc, Deric, my colleague Linda and I myself, representing our party (the applicant), one Hongkong female lawyer & partner and one UK male lawyer & partner from one US law firm together with one CFO from the US headquarters, representing the opposite party (the respondent), had jointly participated in the first hearing of arbitration tribunal.  The two (2) agents from the US law firm appeared to be quite confident and optimistic, holding their trump card at hand.  For the sake of safeguarding the dignity of Chinese laws, we had had to raise our objection to the arbitration tribunal, pointing out that the two (2) lawyers of the opposite party were not entitled to render services of Chinese laws in China, thus not entitled to represent the opposite party in attending the hearing of arbitration tribunal.  With the joint discussions among three (3) arbitrators, the arbitration tribunal had confirmed that the objection from our party had been held valid, all the opinions from the two (2) agents of the opposite party could only be held valid when they were duly confirmed by the agent with the qualifications of Chinese lawyer, and the arbitration hearing should adjourn till the notice for the next arbitration hearing.  The first hearing of arbitration tribunal was suddenly terminated ahead of time as such, and the facial expression of embarrassment could be obviously seen in the US CFO from the headquarters.  The two (2) agents from the US law firm had sent the fax message to us afterwards, accusing us of having ambushed them in the arbitration hearing.  Then one young Chinese lawyer from Shanghai representing the opposite party had additionally attended two (2) arbitration hearings thereafter, only to give on-site endorsement to the opinion statements from and by the two (2) lawyers of the opposite party.  Luc told us privately that the young Chinese lawyer of the opposite party had been invited here to carry bags for foreign lawyers and act as their puppet.  The second arbitration hearing lasted for one whole day, and Luc invited us to lunch with western-style fish at one restaurant managed by one foreigner near the CIETAC building.  I returned to the arbitration tribunal ahead of time alone thereafter, happening to see and find the four (4) members of the opposite party already in the arbitration tribunal, attempting to sit at our seats in the morning by having interchanged the name plate of applicant and that of respondent.  I stepped forward to stop them therefrom and argued with them, with both parties unwilling to give in.  That UK lawyer of the opposite party warned us by the way that we could never expect any fair just award from CIETAC.  Later, the clerk of the arbitration tribunal returned to the arbitration tribunal, yet refused to express any confirmatory opinions on the issue of seat placement.  The other three (3) members including Luc returned there, persuading me not to contend with them therefor.  But, I continued arguing strongly on just grounds, making it clear that this was a matter of principle, I would resolutely stick to it, and the arbitration hearing should be resumed according to the original seat placement in the morning, finally the opposite party gave up their interchange of seat name plates, and both parties were able to continue the arbitration hearing thereafter.  The third also the last arbitration hearing lasted till the late evening.  The arbitrator from Hongkong chosen by the opposite party let her several students attend the whole hearings as visitors.  We had submitted and presented the complete detailed convincing factual evidential documentations to the arbitration tribunal by way of three (3) arbitration hearings, having proved that the project payment should be paid to us, while the counter-claim of the opposite party should remain invalid.  The fair just award was made by the arbitration tribunal of CIETAC in June, 2008, whereby our party had completely won the case.  We accompanied Luc and Deric in their visit to CIETAC afterwards to offer the red banner of honor, expressing our appreciation and respect for the just law enforcement by and from CIETAC.

We helped Luc deal with all the legal affairs of his Belgian company afterwards, from Oriental Plaza, construction sites of foreign embassies, two-level courts in Tianjin to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the like.  Later, Luc returned to Belgium, continuing to conduct the business activities related to China, and remained in touch with us per e-mail and wechat.  Luc left us all of sudden forever at such young age in his prime, leaving us two (2) big regrets: the first is that we have been unable to accept the invitation from Luc and Deric to the tour in Tibet due to the cases we had at hand, and the second is that we have been unable to find the time to visit Luc in Belgium, thinking at the time that we would still have the opportunity to see him there in the future when we, three (3) members of our family, returned to Europe in 2015.

Life is uncertain, worldly things are unpredictable, and we, the ordinary people, cannot change it at all.  What we can do now is to cherish our wonderful memories with Luc in fighting for the common goals together, which has been our professional joy as Chinese lawyers for international legal affairs!  We keep our fingers crossed and pray that Luc’s soul and spirit will ascend to heaven early and rest in calm, peace and joy there! Amitabha! 

Dr. jur. Michael (Zuowei) Liu,

LL.M. (Münster), Attorney-at-Law & Founding Partner

April 5, 2023 Tomb-sweeping Day in Beijing