The Americas · 2021–today
Próspera sues Honduras
Próspera is a US-backed charter-city company that set up in a special economic zone on Honduran land, a zone known by its Spanish initials, ZEDE, which let it run under its own rules. In 2022 Honduras repealed the ZEDE law. In 2024 its Supreme Court declared such zones unconstitutional.
Próspera and others then took Honduras to an arbitration tribunal at ICSID, a World Bank body, under the investor-state rules that let foreign companies sue governments. They claim about US$10.7bn. That is the company's figure, not a finding.
The case is still at its early stages, with no award. It shows how the rules written to protect investors can price a government's choice to change its own law.
- How it worked
- Write rules that bind only others · Compensate the owners
- Who gained
- Nobody yet: the claimant is Próspera and its backers, and no tribunal has awarded anything.
- What it left
- A claim sitting over Honduras's decision to repeal the law, and a test of whether a state can reverse a deal made under it.
- Sources