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The briefing entitled 'Full disclosure rules issued' in the September 1997 issue of International Financial Law Review misstated the definition of public companies in the new Full Disclosure Rules. The following is the correct definition.

The German government has launched a three-pronged initiative aimed at overhauling Germany’s antitrust law and making it Euro-compatible. By Wolfgang von Meibom and Jan Byok of Wessing Berenberg-Gossler Zimmermann Lange, Düsseldorf

In September, the Singapore government issued a statement on the appointment of a committee to review Singapore's strategic legal needs in the financial sector and the conditions under which foreign law firms and foreign lawyers are permitted to operate in Singapore in the context of ensuring Singapore's competitiveness in financial services. The committee is headed by the Attorney-General and consists of a judge, a government official, senior partners of local and foreign law firms and senior officials of local and foreign banks operating in Singapore.

For the first time, the decision of a regulator relating to modifications of a utility's licence has been successfully challenged on the basis that the regulator acted irrationally.

The Russian government has enacted ambitious new legislation designed to strengthen the enforcement of judicial orders. The new rules are to apply to orders issued by all Russian general courts, the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court, the High Arbitration Court, all arbitration courts and foreign courts, as well as orders of certain other government bodies. At present, Russia's Civil Procedural Code, and the procedural rules of the various court systems, govern enforcement procedures, including the conversion and seizure of property to satisfy court judgments. In the emerging Russian market economy, identifying, seizing, and converting assets under a court order is often tedious, time-consuming and expensive. Results vary widely. Officials themselves concede that enforcement practices are weak. The new legislation seeks to address these problems by enforcing compliance with court orders and government decisions and clamping down on delinquent debtors.

MeritaNordbanken, the bank to be formed from the recently announced merger of Finland's Merita Bank and Sweden's Nordbanken, will be the second largest in Scandinavia by value of assets. Only Sweden's Handelsbanken will be larger.

The Danish government is to submit the Amsterdam Treaty to a public referendum. Under the Danish constitution, a public referendum is required in all cases where 'sovereignty' (as the term is used in the constitution) is or could be transferred from the Danish state to another body. At the opening of the Danish parliamentary session in the first week of October, the referendum was scheduled for May 28 1998. The latest polls indicate that most voters are in favour of the Treaty. If the public votes for the Treaty, it will subsequently be ratified by the Danish parliament.

Three years after the Uruguay round of Gatt, the Czech Republic, a party to Gatt and a member of the WTO, has adopted national legislation in line with the agreement on the implementation of Article 6 of Gatt signed in Marrakesh on April 15 1994.

The Insolvency Law Reform Act 1997 (effective as of October 1 1997) introduces a new procedure, designed to facilitate the rescue of financially troubled companies. The reorganization procedure (Unternehmensreorganisation) can be initiated by any business entity (with the exception of banks, pension funds and insurance and securities companies) which are in need of reorganization but which are not yet insolvent.

Decree 2,338 of October 7 1997, published in the official gazette on October 8 1997, implements Law 9,472 of July 16 1997, which created a regulatory agency for the telecoms sector, the National Agency of Telecommunications (ANATEL) and paved the way for the privatization of the operating subsidiaries of the state-owned utility Telebrás.