The applicable law on the international bank guarantee letter: A comparative study.

Considering the needs and data of commercial transactions generated by international trade, and their impact on traditional means of guarantee, which resulted in many difficulties and obstacles, leading to the failure to achieve the results and objectives for which they were established, and their inability to keep up with the developments imposed by international trade; banking custom invented what is called the bank guarantee letter, which some jurists define as: a final commitment issued by the bank at the request of its client, which we call 'the order,' to pay a certain or determinable sum of money as soon as the beneficiary requests it from the bank within a specified period, without being subject to any other condition. According to the commonly accepted rules regarding the conflict of laws, determining the legal system that will apply to international contracts requires resorting to the principle of private international law, known as the principle of "freedom or autonomy of will," which is referred to as making the contract subject to the law of the parties' will. This principle has become an established concept within private international law and has been adopted by many international conventions and legislations, which recognize explicit or implicit will as the criterion for assigning contractual obligations. If the contracting parties make an explicit choice of the law applicable to the contract concluded between them, implicit will is then examined. If it is impossible to determine the implicit will, legislators in some countries—including Egypt and Iraq—take it upon themselves to establish the governing contractual relationship.