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New article on a global legal framework for transnational civil litigation in environmental matters

Former Secretary General of the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH), Hans van Loon, has just published a very interesting article on “Principles and building blocks for a global legal framework for transnational civil litigation in environmental matters” in the Uniform Law Review, Vol. 23, Issue 2, June 2018, pp. 298–318.  An abstract is available at https://doi.org/10.1093/ulr/uny020.

He suggests a number of basic structural components – building blocks – for a global legal framework for transnational civil litigation in environmental matters such as: jurisdiction, applicable law, recognition and enforcement, and judicial and administrative communication and co-operation (pp. 316-318).

Of particular note is the reference to Article 5(1)(j) of the Hague Draft Convention on the Judgments Project, which provides that a judgment is eligible for recognition and enforcement if one of the following requirements is met –

(j) the judgment ruled on a non-contractual obligation arising from death, physical injury, damage to or loss of tangible property, and the act or omission directly causing such harm occurred in the State of origin, irrespective of where that harm occurred.

The author notes the possible challenges that may arise when the harmful event occurred elsewhere (neither in the defendant’s home – Art. 5(1)(a) of the Draft Convention  – , nor in the State of Origin where the act or omission directly causing such harm occurred, see p. 315) and makes recommendations. For more information on this provision and its narrow scope, please refer to the Preliminary Explanatory Report of the Judgments Convention  (paragraph 162bis, pp. 34-35).

Second Issue of 2018’s Revue Critique de Droit International Privé

The last issue of the Revue critique de droit international privé will shortly be released. It contains several casenotes and an article, authored by Campbell McLachlan who is Professor of Law at Victoria University of Wellington (“Entre le conflit de lois, le droit international public et l’application internationale du droit public : le droit des relations externes des Etats »).

The abstract reads as follows:

The relationships between States and individuals of foreign nationality from the perspective of their constitutional rights and freedoms raise a series of issues that all States must resolve and that sit at the interface of the constitutional order of each of them and the intertional legal system through which they are connected. Today, this interface has progressively become porous, raising legal problems in increasing numbers and with increased frequency. The various responses generated thereby exercise a powerful influence over the legal imaginary, including on the ways in which a legal system represents its own relationship with the rest of the world. The thesis developed here is that such responses belong to a third discipline, in between the two traditional, public and private, branches of international law. This discipline can be called «  the law of external relations », borrowing a term from one of the Restatements of the United States but little used in Europe. In what follows, the possible conceptions of this disciplinary field will be explored, along with its relationship to private international law.

A full table of contents is available here.

Just released: New Volume of the Judges’ Newsletter on International Child Protection

By Frédéric Breger, Legal Officer at the Permanent Bureau of the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH)

The Permanent Bureau of the HCCH has just released Volume XXII of the Judges’ Newsletter (Summer-Fall 2018) with a Special Focus on “The Child’s Voice – 15 Years Later”. This “Anniversary” Volume was published in co-operation with Professor Marilyn Freeman (University of Westminster, London, England) and Associate Professor Nicola Taylor (University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand) in the context of their British Academy research grant on the objection of the child under Article 13(2) of the 1980 Child Abduction Convention. It gathers contributions from 25 authors (academics, lawyers, judges, mediators, psychologists…) and covering approximately 15 jurisdictions on the topic of the “objection of the child” exception. Read more