Maputo — Mozambique has won an arbitration case and avoided paying over 100 million US dollars in a case against the Indian company Patel Engineering Ltd (PEL).

According to a statement, after almost four years of litigation, the United Nations Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) handed down its award on 7 February in favor of Mozambique, rejecting all the claims brought by Indian company Patel Engineering Ltd (PEL) against the Mozambican state.

"The facts of this case date back to 2011, when PEL and the Mozambican government signed a Memorandum of Understanding regarding a potential railway-port project to link the Moatize region, in the central province of Tete, to a new deep-water port in Macuse, in the central Zambezia province. Following this, PEL took part in a public tender in 2013, but did not win it. So far, the project has not materialized', reads the document.

However, the document says, the Court concluded that it had no jurisdiction because PEL's actions in Mozambique were limited to pre-investment activity.

"PEL has not made any investment in Mozambique under the Bilateral Investment Treaty between Mozambique and India', it says.

The Attorney General's Office (PGR), which, under the terms of the law, is responsible for providing legal representation and assistance to the state when it is a party to proceedings abroad, declared that it "welcomes this achievement.'