Yves Melin

Yves has 20 years of experience as an international trade and customs lawyer in Brussels. He concentrates on trade remedies (anti-dumping measures, countervailing measures and safeguards re-balancing duties), customs laws and procedures, sanctions, export and import controls, and carbon trading and border adjustment. Yves has represented clients in more than 100 trade remedy investigations, and before the EU Courts in more than 30 disputes relating to international trade and customs laws, including in the landmark cases Ikea Wholesale (C-351/04), XinYi PV (T-586/14) and Jiangsu Seraphim (T-110/17) cases. He is part of  Reed Smith’s global environmental, social and governance (ESG) practice, with a particular focus on supply chain due diligence and the enforcement of environmental (carbon border adjustment, deforestation, etc.) and labour (anti-slavery, compliance with ILO conventions) standards for goods crossing the EU’s and the UK’s borders.

In the customs area, Yves helps clients reduce duty exposure through customs compliance programs, customs duty suspension filings, and customs litigation. Yves has been recommended by Best Lawyers in Belgium – Trade Law (2018-2023) and ranked in Legal 500 EMEA, Customs, Trade, WTO & Anti-Dumping (2013-2022), as well as in Who’s Who Legal, Trade & Customs (2018-2023), Global Elite Thought Leaders and Chambers Global and Europe  International Trade/WTO, Europe/Belgium (2011-2022).

Yves is also one of the founders of Greenlane, Yves acts as Greenlane’s pivotal EU and WTO law contact.

Yves is a member of the Editorial Board of the Global Trade and Customs Journal (Kluwer), member of the steering committee of the Customs Law Academy of the University of Liège and a lecturer in the Universities of Antwerp, Liège and Porto.