Biography: Trade & Customs

Olivier Prost has been a partner at Gide Loyrette Nouel's Brussels office since 2002. He was admitted to the Paris Bar in 1993 and the Brussels Bar in 1994. In 2008, he was appointed as a French foreign trade advisor (conseiller du commerce extérieur de la France).

He set up the international trade law and WTO litigation practices at Gide Loyrette Nouel and advises on high-profile cases in the field of trade defence instruments (anti-dumping, anti-subsidy and safeguard measures), market access and regulatory barriers such as tax discrimination, technical standards, origin/private labelling, health and environmental protection. He is also involved in customs regulation and the growing area of EU export control, embargo and dual-use products.

Due to his presence in Brussels since the early 1990's, Olivier has an in-depth knowledge of both substantive and procedural EU rules. This allows him to monitor the formulation, interpretation and national implementation of EU laws in various sectors (climate/environement, energy, public procurement etc).

Olivier has advised and represented companies and governments in administrative proceedings before the European Commission and in judicial proceedings before the European Courts.

He has also been involved in a number of state-to-state disputes before the WTO. Recently, Olivier represented EIB in the WTO subsidy dispute between the United States and the European Union concerning civil aircraft financing. He has advised China on its first WTO dispute and, in 2008, on the dispute with the United States on cultural goods.

Gide recently recruited as of counsel, Peter Jan Kuijper, former director of the WTO's legal affairs division and of the European Commission's legal service for WTO/external affairs.