Arbitration and EU-Procedural Law: Two Advocate Generals of the CJEU Promote Diverging Views

image_pdfimage_print

Prof. Dr. Burkhard Hess, Director of the MPI Luxembourg, has very kindly accepted to have his view on two recent AG’s opinions published in CoL. Comments are welcome.

Two recent opinions, the one rendered by AG Wathelet on December 8, 2014, in Gazprom (Case C-536/13), and the other one given by AG Jääskinen, on December 11, 2014, in CDC (Case C-352/13) address the interplay between arbitration and EU law, especially in the context of the Brussels I Regulation. Interestingly, the two opinions adopted different perspectives and, therefore, propose different solutions. Moreover, both cases relate to similar issues on the merits: the enforcement of mandatory Union law in the areas of cartel and of energy law. Accordingly, it appears that the two opinions are also based on diverging conceptions on the role of arbitration vis-à-vis mandatory Union law. Therefore, I would like to compare the opinions in order see how EU-law and arbitration should be delineated. As the two cases are currently pending in the CJEU, it is finally up to the Court to decide which direction should be taken.

The opinion in Gazprom: Giving preference to arbitration proceedings

Gazprom is about the admissibility of anti-suit injunctions rendered by an arbitral tribunal (seated in a EU Member State) against civil proceedings pending in civil courts within the European Judicial Area. On the merits, the case is of a highly political significance: it relates to the long-term supply of gas to 90% of the population of Lithuania by the Russian energy giant. According to a framework agreement of 1999 a Lithuanian company (Lietuvos dujos) whose majority was held by Gazprom and the minority by the government was in charge of buying gas from Gazprom and distributing it in Lithuania.  In spring 2011, the Lithuanian Ministry of Energy initiated an investigation on price manipulation against Lieutuvos and its directors and tried to change the management. Under Lithuanian company law, it brought an action in the Lithuanian civil courts in order to secure the investigations against the company. As the shareholder agreement provided for arbitration under the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce, Gazprom initiated arbitration proceedings there. On 31 July 2012, the arbitral tribunal made a “final award” and ordered the Ministry of Energy to withdraw parts of its requests in the Lithuanian court. Finally, the Lithuanian court asked the ECJ whether these orders (which amounted to anti-suit injunctions) were compatible with its empowerment to decide on its jurisdiction under the Regulation Brussels I.

As a starting point, it should be mentioned that the case-law of the CJEU regarding anti-suit injunctions seems to be well settled: In cases C-159/02 Turner and C-185/07 Allianz (West Tankers), the CJEU held that anti-suit injunctions rendered by a court of a EU-Member State against the proceedings pending in another EU-Member State are incompatible with two fundamental principles of EU procedural law. According to the first principle each court has to assess freely whether it has jurisdiction under the Regulation. Furthermore, anti-suit injunctions are incompatible with the principle of mutual trust according to which each court in the European Judicial Area relies, as a matter of principle, on the appropriateness of the judicial systems in other EU-Member States (on this principle, see recently, the Opinion 2/13 of the ECJ of December 18, 2014, on the Accession of the Union to the European Convention of Human Rights, at paras 181 – 195). However, the issue of whether anti-suit injunctions of an arbitral tribunal may impede the proper functioning of European procedural law has not been addressed so far.

In his opinion, AG Wathelet proposed to interpret the Regulation Brussels I in a different way. The Advocate General came to the conclusion that any proceeding where the validity of an arbitration agreement is contested is excluded from the scope of the Brussels I Regulation (para 125). In this respect, the AG proposed to qualify an anti-suit injunction a decision on the validity of the arbitration clause and, consequently, to exclude it from the realm of the Brussels I Regulation. Furthermore, the opinion proposes to reverse the decision of the Grand Chamber in case C-185/07 Allianz/West Tankers (paras 126 – 135). According to the Opinion of AG Wathelet, anti-suit injunctions issued by an arbitral tribunals do not create any problem of compatibility with EU law (para 140).

This result is based on the following arguments: Firstly, the AG denies any legal impact of an anti-suit injunction, being an instrument of English law (para 64), on the Lithuanian government because it could only enforced in England (para 65). Secondly, the Opinion refers to the new Brussels I Regulation 1215/2012 (although temporarily not applicable in the present case, see its Article 66 (1), at para 88). However, the Opinion proposes to apply the (old) Regulation Brussels I as to “be taken into account” (para 89). The AG refers to paragraph 2 of the Recital 12 of the Recast, according to which Art. 1 (2) lit d) of the Brussels I Regulation should be interpreted as excluding “that a ruling regarding the existence and the validity of an arbitration agreement could circulate under the (new) Regulation.” According to AG Wathelet, the new Recital should be interpreted as a reinforcement of the arbitration exclusion, in light of which an anti-suit injunction should no longer give rise to the problems of compatibility which had been highlighted by the CJEU in case C-185/07 Alliance. Accordingly, under the Recast, anti-suit injunctions by state courts are generally permitted (at para 140). Furthermore, the Opinion proposes that the courts of EU Member States have to refrain from any decision-making when an arbitration clause is invoked unless the clause is considered as obviously void (at para 142). In this respect, it comes close to the French doctrine of the positive competence-competence of arbitral tribunals (paras 149, 151 ff.). Finally, the conclusions deny any application of the principle of mutual trust to arbitral tribunals – even to arbitral tribunal seated in the European union and applying mandatory EU law – because arbitral tribunal are not bound by the Brussels I Regulation (paras 153 ff). Eventually, the AG states that an anti-suit injunction cannot be qualified as a ground of non-recognition for a violation of public policy under article V (2)(b) NYC (paras 160 ff).

If this line of reasoning was endorsed by the Grand Chamber, the case law of the CJEU regarding arbitration would change significantly. However, the conclusions are more directed towards the new Regulation 1215/2012 (temporarily not applicable) than to the case under consideration. Although I do not want to criticize the line of reasoning here in its entirety, I would briefly express the following doubts: First, the origins of anti-suit injunctions in English law do not say anything about their cross-border effects. However, the fact that they are more and more often used in international arbitration tells a lot about their impact on litigation (and there are cases where they had been enforced). Second, the legal value of a Recital should not be over-estimated. They are not part of the operative provisions of a Regulation and cannot be interpreted in a way that impedes the efficiency of the Regulation (see in this respect case C-43/13, Pantherwerke, para 20). Furthermore, in the legislative process, there was a consensus that the Recitals are not intended to change the status quo (see e.g. Pohl, IPRax 2013, 110; Hartley, ICLQ 2014, 861). In addition, Recital 12, 2nd paragraph itself does not address proceedings of a court confronted with an arbitration clause (and an injunction prohibiting a party from continuing litigation in its court room), but with the recognition of decisions on the validity of arbitration clauses. Finally, Recital 12 does not endorse the French concept of positive competence-competence. Quite to the contrary, the original proposal of the EU-Commission (elaborated by an expert group) providing for an explicit solution of this issue and designed to comply with specifics of French law was rejected by the Parliament and by the Council in the legislative process.

Yet, it remains to be seen whether the CJEU will endorse this “separation” of arbitration from litigation under the Brussels I Regulation. As a result, it may entail a considerable limitation of the effectiveness of the Brussels I system. The opinion mainly addresses the effectiveness of arbitration (paras 98, 148), the effectiveness of the Brussels I Regulation is only considered to the extent that it corresponds to the NYC (see para 142).

The opinion in CDC: Preserving efficient enforcement of EU-law in front of an arbitration clause

Only three days later, in case CDC, AG Jääskinen addressed the interpretation of an arbitration agreement (or of a jurisdiction agreement falling outside of the scope of Article 23 of Brussels I). “CDC” is about the decentralized enforcement of EU-cartel law by actions for damages in the civil courts of EU-Member States. CDC SA is a Belgian corporation which bought claims from 32 pulp and paper companies which had sustained damages by buying hydrogen peroxyde from a Europe wide cartel between 1994 and 2000. CDC brought legal action against six members of the former cartel in the District Court of Dortmund; the jurisdiction of the court is based on articles 5 no 3 and 6 no 1 of the Brussels’ I Regulation (2001). The damage claimed amounts of more than EUR 475 million (plus interests).

The defendants contest the jurisdiction of the Dortmund court inter alia by relying on jurisdiction and arbitration clauses found in the general terms of sales contracts on hydrogen peroxide. They assert that these clauses include action for cartel damages and apply to CDC which had acquired the damage claims by assignments. The German court asked the CJEU whether these clauses included damage claims for infringements of Article 101 TFEU.

To this question, AG Jääskinen gave the following answer: First, he explicitly held that the Dortmund court may interpret the scope of the arbitration clauses (para 98). Second, he stated that party autonomy includes the right to agree jurisdiction and arbitration clauses (para 119). This consideration applies especially when parties are aware of the claims which are included into these agreements. Furthermore, the scope of each clause has to be determined according to its wording. However, the Advocate General concluded that jurisdiction and arbitration clauses should not be interpreted in a way to impede the full effectiveness and the enforcement of mandatory cartel law (para 126). As a result, arbitration and jurisdiction clauses should be interpreted in a way that delictual claims for breaches of article 101 TFEU are excluded.

Again, I do not want to criticize these conclusions in detail (as I have to disclose my involvement in this case). However, the approach of AG Jääskinen seems to differ considerably from the views of AG Wathelet as the former is mainly addressing the efficiency of mandatory EU law (to be implemented by the national courts) and the latter is mainly concerned about the efficiency of arbitration. It remains to be seen what the CJEU will decide. It is to be hoped that the court will draw a fair line between arbitration and litigation bringing both in a balanced situation which permits the efficient enforcement of EU law in dispute resolution.