Essentially, Belmopan had convinced Justice Samuel Awich that Ashcroft, Jose Alpuche, Keith Arnold, Dean Boyce, Phillip Osbourne, Edilberto Tesecum and Phillip Zuniga controlled Dunkeld Investments. Ashcroft et al disputed that position maintaining that in fact six companies, including BCB Holdings, Ecom, Mercury, New Horizons Limited and Thiermon Limited, which held shares in BTL at the time when the telecommunications company was nationalized, were only holding those shares in trust(!) for Hayward International and Dunkeld Investments.

As a result, they claimed that Dunkeld could, under the International Investment Treaty between Belize and the United Kingdom, invoke arbitration proceedings. However, in February Justice Awich granted Belmopan an injunction barring Dunkeld and the seven others from proceeding with the arbitration.

But they didn't just cease and desist because of the court order, they were also keenly aware that the Dean Barrow administration had amended the law to make it so that anyone guilty of Contempt would face substantial fines of more than a hundred thousand dollars or in the alternative, five years in jail.

With that in mind, the Ashcroft group took their case to the Court of Appeal. After three days of submissions before the panel of the Court of Appeal in mid-May, the Honorable Justices today announced that the Awich injunction is lifted.