Views
ECJ on the interpretation of the European Succession Regulation in relation to cross-border declarations of waiver, Judgment of 2 June 2022, C-617/20 – T.N. et al. ./. E.G.
On 2 June 2022, the ECJ delivered its judgment in the case of T.N. et al. ./. E.G., C-617/20, on the interpretation of the ESR in relation to cross-border declarations of waiver of succession (on the facts of the case and AG Maciej Szpunar’s Opinion in this case see our previous post).
The Court followed the AG’s Opinion and concluded (para. 51) that
“Articles 13 and 28 of Regulation No 650/2012 must be interpreted as meaning that a declaration concerning the waiver of succession made by an heir before a court of the Member State of his or her habitual residence is regarded as valid as to form in the case where the formal requirements applicable before that court have been complied with, without it being necessary, for the purposes of that validity, for that declaration to meet the formal requirements of the law applicable to the succession”.
This conclusion was based on a EU-law specific approach rather than by discussing, let alone resorting to, fundamental concepts of private international law (compare Question 1 by the referring national court, the Higher Regional Court of Bremen, Germany, on a potential application of the concept of substitution; compare the AG’s considerations on characterisation of the issue as “substance” or “form”, see Opinion, paras. 34 et seq.). Rather, the Court reformulates the question functionally (para. 32):
“The present reference for a preliminary ruling concerns the conditions which must be satisfied in order for a declaration concerning the waiver of succession, within the meaning of Articles 13 and 28 of Regulation No 650/2012, made before the court of the State of the habitual residence of the party waiving succession, to be regarded as valid. In that regard, the referring court asks, in particular, whether and, if so, when and how such a declaration must be notified to the court having jurisdiction to rule on the succession”.
Textual as well as systematic arguments (Article 13 as part of Chapter II, Article 28 as part of Chapter III of the ESR), paras. 36 et seq., supported by Recital 32 (simplification of procedures), para. 41, as well as the general effet utile of the ESR in light of Recital 7, para. 42, lead the Court to the result that
“as the Advocate General stated in point 64 of his Opinion, compliance with the objective of Regulation No 650/2012, which is to enable heirs to make declarations concerning the waiver of succession in the Member State of their habitual residence, implies that those heirs are not required to take further formal actions before the courts of other Member States other than those provided for by the law of the Member State in which such a declaration is made, in order for such declarations to be regarded as valid”.
Whether this result occurs, technically speaking, as a substitution – and thus by a kind of “recognition”, or as a matter of characterisation of the issue as “form”, is not directly spelled out, but based on the general approval of the AG’s approach, the latter is certainly more likely than the former.
Additionally, in furthering the effet utile, the Court adds on the issue of communication of and time limits for a waiver declared according to the conditions of the law of the habitual residence (paras. 49 et seq.) that compliance with “formal requirements” before the court of the habitual residence must suffice as long as the court seised with the succession “has become aware of the existence of that declaration”. And the threshold for this awareness seems to be very low, but “in the absence of a uniform system in EU law providing for the communication of declarations” of the kind in question here, must be brought about by the declaring person (para. 48). As a further element of effet utile, this person is not bound by any formal requirements under the lex successionis, para. 48: “if those steps [by the declaring person] are not taken within the time limit prescribed by the law applicable to the succession, the validity of such a declaration cannot be called into question” (emphasis added). The only factual time limit therefore is that the court becomes aware before it takes its decision. Appeal, therefore, cannot be grounded directly on the fact that the court was not made aware in time, even though the declaration had existed before the court’s decision. Appeal may be available on other grounds and then the declaration may be introduced as a novum, if the lex fori processualis allows it.
Speaking of the lex fori processualis: As there is now an autonomous time limit, the question became irrelevant whether making the court aware of the declaration of waiver depends on any language requirements. In the concrete case, the persons declaring the waiver before a Dutch court, obviously in Dutch language, informed the German court first by submitting Dutch documents and only later with translations, but at any rate before the court’s decision. Principally speaking, however, if the court’s language is e.g. German, any kind of communication must be conducted in that language (see section 184 German Gerichtsverfassungsgesetz). In addition, according to the Court’s decision, only “formal requirements of the law applicable to the succession” are irrelevant. The need for translations, however, is a matter of the lex fori processualis. It will be an interesting question of “language law” within the EU whether the effet utile of the ESR (and comparable regulations in other instruments) might overcome principal language requirements according to the lex fori processualis. And on a general level it may be allowed to state the obvious: questions of characterisation (and others of general PIL methodology) will never disappear.
Tort Litigation against Transnational Companies in England
This post is an abridged adaptation of my recent article, Private International Law and Substantive Liability Issues in Tort Litigation against Multinational Companies in the English Courts: Recent UK Supreme Court Decisions and Post-Brexit Implications in the Journal of Private International Law. The article can be accessed at no cost by anyone, anywhere on the journal’s website. The wider post-Brexit implications for private international law in England are considered at length in my recent OUP monograph, Brexit and the Future of Private International Law in English Courts.
According to a foundational precept of company law, companies have separate legal personality and limited liability. Lord Templeman referred to the principle in Salomon v Salomon & co Ltd [1896] UKHL 1, as the ‘unyielding rock’ on which company law is constructed. (See Lord Templeman, ‘Forty Years On’ (1990) 11 Company Lawyer 10) The distinct legal personality and limited liability of each entity within a corporate group is also recognized. In Adams v Cape Industries plc [1990] Ch 433 the court rejected the single economic unit argument made in the DHN Ltd v Tower Hamlets LBC [1976] 1 WLR 852 decision, and also the approach that the court will pierce the corporate veil if it is necessary to achieve justice. In taking the same approach as the one taken in Salomon v Salomon & co Ltd [1896] UKHL 1, the court powerfully reasserted the application of limited liability and the separate legal entity doctrine in regard to corporate groups, leaving hundreds of current and future victims uncompensated, whilst assisting those who seek to minimize their losses and liabilities through manipulation of the corporate form, particularly in relation to groups of companies. A parent company is normally not liable for the legal infractions and unpaid debts of its subsidiaries. However, the direct imposition of duty of care on parent companies for torts committed by foreign subsidiaries has emerged as an exception to the bedrock company law principles of separate legal personality and limited liability. In Chandler v Cape plc [2012] EWCA Civ 525, [69], Arden LJ ‘……emphatically reject[ed] any suggestion that this court [was] in any way concerned with what is usually referred to as piercing the corporate veil.’
Arguments drawn from private international law’s largely untapped global governance function inform the analysis in the article and the methodological pluralism manifested in the jurisdictional and choice of law solutions proposed. It is through the postulation of territoriality as a governing principle that private international law has been complicit in thwarting the ascendance of transnational corporate social responsibility. (See H Muir-Watt, ‘Private International Law Beyond the Schism’ (2011) 2 Transnational Legal Theory 347, 386) Private international law has kept corporate liability within the limits of local law through forum non conveniens and the lex loci delicti commissi. It is only recently that a challenge of territoriality has emerged in connection with corporate social responsibility.
Extraterritoriality is employed in this context as a method of framing a private international law problem rather than as an expression of outer limits. Therefore, there is nothing pejorative about regulating companies at the place of their seat, and there is no reason why the state where a corporate group is based should not (and indeed should not be obliged to) sanction that group’s international industrial misconduct on the same terms as similar domestic misconduct, in tort claims for harm suffered by third parties or stakeholders. (Muir-Watt (ibid) 386)
The idea of methodological pluralism, driven by the demands of global governance, can result in jurisdictional and choice of law rules that adapt to the needs of disadvantaged litigants from developing countries, and hold multinational companies to account. The tort-based parental duty of care approach has been utilized by English courts for holding a parent company accountable for the actions of its subsidiary. The limited liability and separate legal entity principles, as applied to corporate groups, are circumvented by the imposition of direct tortious liability on the parent company.
The UK Supreme Court’s landmark decisions in Vedanta v Lungowe [2019] UKSC 20 and Okpabi v Shell [2021] UKSC 3 have granted jurisdiction and allowed such claims to proceed on the merits in English courts. The decisions facilitate victims of corporate human rights and environmental abuse by providing clarity on significant issues. Parent companies may assume a duty of care for the actions of their subsidiaries by issuing group-wide policies. Formal control is not necessarily the determining factor for liability, and any entity that is involved with the management of a particular function risks being held responsible for any damage flowing from the performance of that function. When evaluating whether a claimant can access substantial justice in another forum, English courts may consider the claimants lack of financial and litigation strength. The UK Supreme Court decisions are in alignment with the ethos of the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (“Ruggie Principles”), particularly the pillar focusing on greater access by victims to an effective remedy. (The United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, UN Doc. A/HRC/17/31 (2011))
Post-Brexit, the broader availability of the doctrine of forum non conveniens may help the English courts to ward off jurisdictional challenges against parent companies for damage caused by their subsidiaries at the outset. However, in exceptional cases, the claimant’s lack of financial and litigation strength in the natural forum may be considered under the interests of justice limb of The Spiliada test, which motivate an English court not to stay proceedings. (Spiliada Maritime Corpn v Cansulex Ltd (The Spiliada) [1987] AC 460) It has been argued that if the Australian “clearly inappropriate forum” test for forum non conveniens is adopted, (Voth v Manildra Flour Mills Pty Ltd (1991) 65 A.L.J.R. 83 (HC); Regie National des Usines Renault SA v Zhang [2002] HCA 10 (HC)) it is unlikely that a foreign claimant seeking compensation from a parent company in an English court would see the case dismissed on forum non conveniens grounds. As a result, it is more likely that a disadvantaged foreign litigant will succeed in overcoming the jurisdictional hurdle when suing the parent company. From a comparative law standpoint, the adoption of the Australian common law variant of forum non conveniens will effectively synthesize The Spiliada’s wide-ranging evaluative enquiry with the certainty and efficiency inherent in the mandatory rules of direct jurisdiction of the Brussels-Lugano regime.
In relation to choice of law for cross-border torts, the UK has wisely decided to adopt the Rome II Regulation as retained EU law. (See The Law Applicable to Contractual Obligations and Non-Contractual Obligations (Amendment etc.) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019) Article 4(1) of the Rome II Regulation will continue to lead to the application of the law of the country where the damage occurred. Post-Brexit, it remains to be seen whether the English courts would be more willing to displace the applicable law under Article 4(1) by applying Article 4(3) of Rome II more flexibly. The territorial limitations of the lex loci damni might be overcome by applying the principle of closest connection to select a more favorable law. The result-selectivism inherent in the idea of a favorable law is reminiscent of the regulatory approach of governmental interest analysis. (See SC Symeonides, Codifying Choice of Law Around the World (OUP 2014) 287) Article 7 of the Rome II Regulation provides the claimant in an environmental damage claim a choice of applicable law either pursuant to Article 4(1) or the law of the country in which the event giving rise to the damage occurred. Alternatively, any regulatory provisions in English law may be classified as overriding mandatory provisions of the law of the forum under Article 16 of the Rome II Regulation. The Rome II Regulation, under the guise of retained EU law, constitutes a unique category of law that is neither EU law nor English law per se. The interpretation of retained EU law will give rise to its own set of challenges. Ultimately, fidelity to EU law will have to be balanced with the ability of UK appellate courts to depart from retained EU law and develop their own jurisprudence.
Any future amendments to EU private international law will not affect the course of international civil litigation before English courts. (Cf A Dickinson, ‘Walking Solo – A New Path for the Conflict of Laws in England’ Conflictoflaws.net, suggests engagement with the EU’s reviews of the Rome I and II Regulations will provide a useful trigger for the UK to re-assess its own choice of law rules with a view to making appropriate changes) However, recent developments in the UK and Europe are a testament to the realization that the avenue for access to justice for aggrieved litigants may lead to parent companies that are now subject to greater accountability and due diligence.
The Applicability of Arbitration Agreements to A Non-Signatory Guarantor—A Perspective from the Chinese Judicial Practice
(authored by Chen Zhi, Wangjing & GH Law Firm, PhD Candidate at the University of Macau)
It is axiomatic that an arbitration agreement is generally not binding on a non-signatory unless some exceptional conditions are satisfied or appear, while it could even be more controversial in cases relating to guarantee where a non-signatory third person provides guarantee to the master agreement in which an arbitration clause has been incorporated. Due to the close connection between guarantee contract and master agreement in their contents, parties or even some legal practitioners may take it for granted that the arbitration agreement in master agreement can be automatically extended to the guarantor albeit it is not a signatory, which can be a grave misunderstanding from judicial perspective and results in great loss thereby.
As a prime example, courts in China have long been denying the applicability of arbitration agreements to a non-signatory guarantor with rare exceptions based on specific circumstances as could be observed in individual cases, nonetheless, the recent legal documents have provided possibilities that may point to the opposite side. This short essay looks into this issue.
- The Basic Stance in China: Severability of the Guarantee Contract
Statutes in China provide limited grounds for extension of arbitration agreement to a non-signatory. As set out in Articles 9 & 10 of the Interpretation of the Supreme People’s Court’s (hereinafter, SPC) on Certain Issues Related to the Application of the Arbitration Law?which was issued on 23 August 2006?, this may occur only under the following circumstances:
“(1) An arbitration clause is binding on the non-signatory who is the successor of a signed-party by means of merge, spilt-up of an entity and decease of a natural person or;
(2) where the rights and obligations are assigned or transferred wholly or partially to a non-signatory, unless parties have otherwise consented”.
Current laws are silent on the issue where there is a guarantee relationship. Due to the paucity of direct instructions, some creditors seeking for tribunal’s seizure of jurisdiction over a non-signatory guarantor would tend to invoke Article 129 of the SPC’s Interpretation on Certain Issues Related to Application of Warranty Law (superseded by SPC’s Interpretation on Warranty Chapter of Civil Code since 2021 with no material changes being made), which stipulates that the guarantee contract shall be subject to the choice of court clause as set out in the main agreement, albeit the creditor and guarantor have otherwise consent on dispute resolution. Nevertheless, courts in China are reluctant to apply Article 129 to an arbitration clause by way of mutatis mutandis. In the landmark case of Huizhou Weitong Real Estate Co., Ltd v. Prefectural People’s Government of Huizhou,[1] the SPC explicitly ruled that the Guarantee Letter entered into between creditor and guarantor had created an independent civil relationship which shall be distinguished from the main agreement and thereby the arbitration clause should not be binding on the guarantor and the court seized with the case could take the case accordingly. In a nutshell, due to the independence of the guarantee contract from the main contract, where there is no clear arbitration agreement in the guarantee contract, the arbitration agreement in the main contract cannot be extended to be applicable to the guarantor.
The jurisprudence of Weitong has been subsequently followed and acknowledged as the mainstream opinion for the issue. In SPC’s reply to Guangxi Provincial High Court regarding enforcement of a foreign-related arbitral award rendered by CIETAC on 13 September 2006?Dongxun?,[2] where a local government had both issued a guarantee letter and signed the main agreement, the SPC opined that as there was no term of guarantee provided in the text of main agreement, the issuance of guarantee letter and signature of main agreement was not sufficient to make the government a party to the arbitration clause. In light of this, SPC agreed with the Guangxi Court’s stance that the dispositive section regarding execution of guarantee obligation as set out in the disputed arbitral award had exceeded the tribunal’s power and thus shall be rejected to be enforced. In the same vein, in its reply on 20 March 2013 to Guangdong Provincial High Court regarding the annulment of an arbitral award[3], the SPC held that the disputed arbitral award shall be partially vacated for the arbitral tribunal’s lack of jurisdiction over the guarantee for which the guarantor was a natural person. Hence, it can be drawn that whether the guarantor is a governmental institution or other entity for public interest is not the determining factor to be considered for this type of cases.
- Controversies and Exceptions
Theoretically, it is correct for the SPC to unfold the autonomous nature of arbitration jurisdiction, which shall be distinguished from that of litigation. Parties’ autonomy to designate arbitration as a method of dispute resolution and the existence of an arbitration agreement are key elements for a tribunal to be able to obtain the jurisdiction. By this logic, the mere issuance of guarantee letter or signature of a standing-alone guarantee is not sufficient to prove parties’ consent to arbitration as expressed in the main contract. The SPC is not alone in this respect. Actually, one of the much-debated cases by foreign courts is the decision made by the Swiss Supreme Court in 2008 which opined that a guarantor providing guarantee by virtue of a standing-alone letter was not bound by the arbitration clause as provided in the main agreement to which the guarantee letter has been referred, except there was an assumption of contractual rights or obligations, or a clear reference to the said arbitration clause. [4]
All that being said, the SPC’s proposition has given rise to some controversies for the sacrifice of efficiency through a dogmatic understanding of arbitration. Moreover, the segregation of the main contract and guarantee contract may produce risks of parallel proceedings and conflicting legally-effective results. As some commentators have indicated, albeit the severability of guarantee contract in its formality, its content is tight with the main agreement. In the light of the tight connection,[5] the High Court of England ruled in Stellar that it was predictably expectable for a rational businessman to agree on a common method of dispute resolution as set out in the main contract, where the term of guarantor’s endorsement was involved, based on the close connection between the two contracts.[6]
A like but nuanced approach, however, has been developed through individual cases in China, to the author’s best knowledge, one of the prime cases is Li v. Yu decided by Hangzhou Intermediate Court on 30 March 2018 concerning an annulment of an award handed down via arbitration proceedings.[7] The case concerns a main agreement entered into by the creditor, the debtor and the guarantor (who was also the legal representative of the debtor), which had set out a general guarantee term but did not provide detailed obligations. The guarantor subsequently issued a guarantee letter without any clear reference to arbitration clause as stated in main agreement. After the dispute arose, the creditor lodged arbitration requests against both the debtor and the guarantor, the tribunal ruled in creditor’s favor after tribunal proceedings started. The guarantor then applied for annulment of the arbitral award on the basis that there was no valid arbitration agreement between the guarantor and the creditor, contending tribunal’s lack of jurisdiction over the guarantor. The court, however, opined that the guarantor’s signature in the main agreement, in combination of the general guarantee clause incorporated therein, was sufficient to prove the existence of arbitration agreement between the creditor and the guarantor and the guarantor’s consent thereby. Therefore, the annulment application was dismissed by the court.
Admittedly, the opinion as set out in Li is sporadic and cannot provide certainty, largely relying on specific circumstances drawn from individual cases, hence it is difficult to produce a new principle hereby. However, the case does have some novelties by providing a new track for extension of arbitration agreement to a guarantor who is not clearly set out as one of the parties in main agreement. In other words, the presumption of severability of guarantee relationship is not absolute and thus rebuttable. To reach that end, creditors shall furnish proof that the guarantor shall be well aware of the details of the main contract (including arbitration clause) and has shown inclination to be bound thereby.
- New Rules That Shed New Light
On 31 December 2021, the SPC released Meeting Note of the National Symposium on Foreign-related Commercial and Maritime Trials, which covers judicial review issues on arbitration agreements. Article 97 of the Meeting Note provides systematical approach in reviewing arbitration agreement where an affiliated agreement?generally refers to guarantee contract or other kinds of collateral contract?is concerned, which can be divided into two facets:
First, where the guarantee contract provides otherwise dispute resolution, such consent is binding on the guarantor and thus shall be enforceable. As a corollary, the arbitration agreement in main agreement is not extensible to the guarantor.
Secondly, while the guarantee contract is silent on the issue of dispute resolution, the arbitration agreement as set forth in the main agreement is not automatically binding on the guarantor unless the parties to the guarantee contract is the same as that of main agreement.
In summary, the Meeting Note has sustained the basic stance while providing an exception where the main agreement and the guarantee contract are entered into by the same parties. As indicated by one commentator, the Meeting Note is not a judicial interpretation which can be adopted by the courts to decide cases directly but it to a large extent reflects consensus of judges among China, [8] and hence will produce impact on judicial practice across the whole country.
Nevertheless, some uncertainties may still arise, for instance, whether a mere signature in the main contract by the guarantor is sufficient to furnish the proof about “the same parties”, or shall be in combination with the scenario where an endorsement term of guarantor is incorporated in the main contract. On the contrary, it is also unclear whether a mere existence of term of guarantee is sufficient to make a non-signatory guarantor a party to the main contract.
Another more arbitration-friendly method can be observed from the draft for Revision of Arbitration Law that has been released for public consultation since 30th July of 2021, Article 24 of which provides that the arbitration clause as set out in the main agreement shall prevail over that in the guarantee contract where there is a discrepancy; where the guarantee contract is silent on dispute resolution, any dispute connected thereto shall be subject to the arbitration agreement as set out in main agreement. This article is a bold one which will largely overturn the SPC’s current stance and makes guarantee relationship an exception. A piece of more exciting news comes from the newly-released law-making schedule of 2022 by the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress,[9] according to which the revision of Arbitration Law is listed as one of the top priorities in 2022 whilst it is still to be seen whether Article 24 in the draft can be retained after scrutiny of the legislature.
- Concluding Remarks
It is not uncommon that a guarantee for certain debts is provided by virtue of a standing-alone document which is separated from the main contract, whether it is a guarantee contract or a unilaterally-issued guarantee letter. It shall be borne in mind that the close connection between the guarantee document and main contract alone is not sufficient to extend the arbitration agreement as set out in main agreement to a non-signatory guarantor per the consistent legal practice in China over the past 20 years. While the new rules have provided more arbitration-friendly approaches, uncertainties and ambiguities will probably still exist.
From a lawyer’s perspective, as the mainstream opinion in judicial remains unchanged currently, it is necessary to attach higher importance while reviewing a standing-alone guarantee contract which is separated from a master agreement in its formality. In the light of avoiding prospective parallel proceedings incurred thereby, the author advances two options in this respect:
The first option is to insert an article endorsing guarantee’s obligation into the master agreement, and require the guarantor to sign the master agreement, which resembles the scenario in Stellar and Li. Whereas this approach may be less feasible in the post-negotiation phase of master agreement when all terms and conditions are fixed and endorsed, the option mentioned below can be served as an alternative.
The second option is to incorporate into guarantee document a clause which unequivocally refers to the arbitration agreement as set out in master agreement, in lieu of any revision to the master agreement. This approach is in line with Article 11 SPC on Certain Issues Related to the Application of the Arbitration Law which provides that parties can reach an arbitration agreement by reference to dispute resolution clauses as set out in other contracts or documents. While it is noteworthy that from judicial practice in China, such reference shall be specific and clear, otherwise the courts may be reluctant to acknowledge the existence of such arbitration agreement.
[1] Case No: 2001 Min Er Zhong No. 177.
[2] Case No: 2006 Min Si Ta No. 24.
[3] Case No: 2013 Min Si Ta No. 9.
[4] Case No. 4A_128/2008,decided on August 19, 2008, decided by Tribunal federal(Supreme Court) of Swiss, as cited in Extension of arbitration clause to non-signatories (case of a guarantor) – Arbitration clause by reference to the main contract (deemed too general and therefore not admitted), available at https://www.swissarbitrationdecisions.com/extension-of-arbitration-clause-to-non-signatories-case-of-a-gua.
[5] See Yifei Lin: Is Arbitration Agreement in Master Agreement Applicable to Guarantee Agreement? Available at http://www.360doc.com/content/16/0124/11/30208892_530188388.shtml.
[6] Stellar Shipping Co Llc v Hudson Shipping Lines [2010] EWHC 2985 (Comm) (18 November 2010).
[7] Case No: 2018 Zhe 01 Min Te No. 23.
[8] Lianjun Li et al?China issues judicial guidance on foreign related matters, Reed Smith In-depth?25 April 2022??available at https://www.reedsmith.com/de/perspectives/2022/04/china-issues-judicial-guidance-on-foreign-related-matters.
[9] For more details, please see the news post available at https://m.thepaper.cn/baijiahao_18072465. Moreover, per the news report released in late May of 2022, The National Committee of Chinese People‘s Political Consultative Conference had discussed the revision of Arbitration Law in its biweekly symposium held on 30 May 2022, where the attendees had stressed the significance of party autonomy in commercial arbitration, available at: http://www.icppcc.cn/newsDetail_1092041.
News
CJEU, Case C-566/22, Inkreal v. Dúha reality: Choice of another Member State’s court in an otherwise purely domestic case is sufficient to apply Art. 25 Brussels Ibis Regulation
In its judgment of 8 February 2024, the CJEU had to decide whether “the application of the Brussels Ibis Regulation be based solely on the fact that two parties with their seat in the same Member State agree on the jurisdiction of courts of another EU Member State.”
The case concerned two loans granted to Dúha reality, a Slovak company, by a third party also domiciled in Slovakia, in 2016 and 2017 respectively. Both loan contracts contained an identical choice of forum clause stating that any ‘dispute shall be settled by a court of the Czech Republic having substantive and territorial jurisdiction’. In 2021, the receivables arising from those loan agreements were assigned to Inkreal, another purely Slovak business corporation, who upon non-payment by the debtor brought action in the Czech Republic. Seeking, inter alia, to determine the specific Czech court having territorial jurisdiction, the Czech Supreme Court (Nejvyšší soud) referred the question to the CJEU.
First Issue for Lloyd’s Maritime and Commercial Law Quarterly in 2024
The first issue for Lloyd’s Maritime and Commercial Law Quarterly in 2024 was published recently. It contains the following articles and case notes.
Articles:
Andrew Dickinson, “Electronic trade documents and the conflict of laws in the United Kingdom”
The Electronic Trade Documents Act 2023, which entered into force on 20 September 2023, seeks to facilitate the use of trade documents (including bills of exchange, promissory notes and bills of lading) in electronic form by assimilating these instruments, and their legal effects, to the equivalent paper trade documents, provided that the systems used to process the relevant information meet certain technological requirements. However, the Act contains no provision that expressly addresses the legislation’s cross-border dimension or its relationship to the United Kingdom’s conflict of laws rules. This article considers how these matters should best be addressed in order to secure the Act’s promised economic benefits.
Just published: De los retos a las oportunidades en el derecho de familia y sucesiones internacional. (2023). Tirant lo Blanch – open access
This book brings together the contributions made at the 6th AEPDIRI Seminar on current issues in Private International Law, held at the Faculty of Law of the University of Seville, which was entitled “De los retos a las oportunidades en el derecho de familia y sucesiones internacional” (From challenges to opportunities in international family and succession law), Campuzano Díaz, B., Diago Diago, P., Rodríguez Vázquez, Mª.A. (dirs.). An English translation of the blurb is provided by the directors: