WTO Appellate Body

The Appellate Body (AB) is a permanent seven-member tribunal established under Article 17 of the WTO's Dispute Settlement Understanding (DSU), which entered into force on 1 January 1995 alongside the Marrakesh Agreement creating the WTO. It hears appeals from reports issued by ad hoc dispute settlement panels, but its review is limited to issues of law covered in the panel report and legal interpretations developed by the panel — it does not re-examine facts.

Members serve four-year terms, renewable once, and are chosen for their expertise in law, international trade, and the covered agreements. Each appeal is heard by a division of three members. The AB may uphold, modify, or reverse panel conclusions; its reports, once adopted by the Dispute Settlement Body (DSB) under the negative consensus rule, are binding on the parties.

Since December 2019 the Appellate Body has been effectively paralysed. The United States, citing concerns about overreach, judicial activism, treatment of "zeroing" in anti-dumping cases, and the 90-day deadline in DSU Art. 17.5, blocked the launch of selection processes for new members beginning in 2017 under the Obama and Trump administrations. When the terms of Ujal Singh Bhatia and Thomas Graham expired on 10 December 2019, the AB fell below the three-member quorum needed to hear appeals. As of writing it remains non-functional, leaving panel reports vulnerable to being "appealed into the void."

In response, the EU and a group of members created the Multi-Party Interim Appeal Arbitration Arrangement (MPIA) in April 2020, using DSU Article 25 arbitration to replicate appellate review among willing participants. Reform negotiations on dispute settlement, mandated by the MC12 Outcome Document (June 2022), are ongoing, with members aiming for a fully functioning system, though no agreement on restoring the AB itself has been reached.