Tag: Forum conveniens

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Turkish Supreme Court rejects choice of court agreement on basis of ‘good faith’. Accepts asymmetric clauses.

Koray Söğüt and Suha Yılmaz reported recently on Turkish Supreme Court case-law in the area of choice of court. The report is very much worth a read. On choice of court agreements, what the Supreme Court seems to say is that when choice of court is made away from Turkey,  Turkish law will make that choice subject to a de facto forum conveniens assessment: if Turkey is a suitable forum especially when the eventual judgment will be easily enforced against Turkish assets, a defendant’s insistence on exercising the clause must be seen as violating Turkey’s general provision on bad faith (a form of fraus omnia corrumpit).

It is also reported that the Supreme Court accepted a unilateral /asymmetric jurisdiction clause – the issues surrounding these clauses are a regular feature on this blog.

More cases for the comparative law class! (At least if and when I get hold of an English translation).

Geert.

 

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Liability for defective products and the relationship between Brussels I and Rome II. The ECJ in Kainz.

In Case C-45/13 Andreas Kainz v Pantherwerke AG, the ECJ held on the determination of locus delicti commissi, the place giving rise to the damage, in the case of defective products. It held this was the place where the product in question was manufactured. The special jurisdictional rules of Article 5 are in effect forum conveniens applications: they are intended to enable the court objectively best placed to determine whether the elements establishing the liability of the person sued are present, to assume jurisdiction. For product liability cases, this includes inter alia the possibility of gathering evidence in order to establish the defect in question.

Pantherwerke AG is an undertaking established in Germany which manufactures and sells bicycles. Mr Kainz,  resident in Salzburg, purchased a bicycle manufactured by Pantherwerke from Funbike GmbH, a company established in Austria. On 3 July 2009, while riding that bicycle in Germany, Mr Kainz suffered a fall and was thereby injured. The place of the event giving rise to the damage is, Mr Kainz claims, located in Austria as the bicycle was brought into circulation there, in the sense that the product was there made available to the end-user by way of commercial distribution.

Mr Kainz argued specifically that the Courts should take into account not only the interests of the proper administration of justice but also those of the person sustaining the damage, thereby enabling him to bring his action before a court of the Member State in which he is domiciled. The ECJ disagreed, at 20:

‘although it is apparent from recital 7 in the preamble to Regulation No 864/2007 that the European Union legislature sought to ensure consistency between Regulation No 44/2001, on the one hand, and the substantive scope and the provisions of Regulation No 864/2007, on the other, that does not mean, however, that the provisions of Regulation No 44/2001 must for that reason be interpreted in the light of the provisions of Regulation No 864/2007. The objective of consistency cannot, in any event, lead to the provisions of Regulation No 44/2001 being interpreted in a manner which is unconnected to the scheme and objectives pursued by that regulation.’

This is a statement I like a lot and have advocated for some time. In general, I find the link between applicable law and jurisdiction (often leading to Gleichlauf-type considerations; such as in Article 22’s exclusive jurisdictional rules) not very attractive.

Geert.

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