Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-05-07098/USCOURTS-caDC-05-07098-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 890
Nature of Suit: Other Statutory Actions
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals 

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued March 3, 2006 Decided May 19, 2006 

No. 05-7098 

FG HEMISPHERE ASSOCIATES, LLC, 

APPELLEE

V. 

DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO, 

APPELLANT

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the District of Columbia 

(No. 03cv-01314) 

Irene M. Solet, Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, 

argued the cause as amicus curiae in support of appellant. With 

her on the brief were Kenneth L. Wainstein, U.S. Attorney, and 

Douglas N. Letter, Attorney. 

Stephen F. Malouf, pro hac vice, argued the cause for 

appellant. On the briefs was Steven D. Cundra. Jeffrey M. 

Sherman entered an appearance. 

Bradford A. Berenson argued the cause for appellee. With 

him on the brief was Eric A. Shumsky. 

Before: RANDOLPH and TATEL, Circuit Judges, and 

WILLIAMS, Senior Circuit Judge. 

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Opinion for the Court filed by Senior Circuit Judge

WILLIAMS. 

WILLIAMS, Senior Circuit Judge: FG Hemisphere 

Associates seeks to execute a default judgment against two 

Washington, DC dwellings owned by the Democratic Republic 

of Congo (“DRC”). DRC diplomatic officials resided in these 

properties by virtue of their official capacities up until the mid1990s, when political disruption led to their removal from office 

but not from the properties. (In 2005-06, the DRC succeeded in 

recovering the properties for use as diplomatic residencies.) FG 

Hemisphere’s predecessor-in-interest obtained a default 

judgment against the DRC for breach of a credit agreement

unrelated to the properties. FG Hemisphere then sought writs of 

execution against the two properties—their first mention in the 

litigation. The DRC again defaulted. Some two months later, 

the DRC filed a Rule 60(b) motion to quash the execution order, 

arguing, among other things, that its failure to respond earlier 

was due to “excusable neglect” and that the two properties were 

immune from execution under 28 U.S.C. § 1609 as “property in 

the United States of a foreign state.” The district court denied 

the motion. The DRC appeals, and we reverse and remand the 

district court’s order. The DRC’s neglect in the delay of its 

response to the motion to execute was excusable. 

* * * 

In 1980 the DRC (then the Republic of Zaire) and its stateowned electric company Société Nationale d’Électricité 

(“SNEL”) entered into a credit agreement with Energoinvest to 

finance the construction of an electric power transmission 

facility in Zaire. The DRC failed to repay, and in 2003, after an 

arbitration at which the DRC failed to appear, Energoinvest 

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obtained an arbitration award of roughly $11.7 million. After 

providing the DRC with formal diplomatic service, Energoinvest 

in September 2004 obtained a default judgment from the U.S. 

district court for the District of Columbia confirming the arbitral 

award. Energoinvest assigned its rights in the award to FG 

Hemisphere, a company that identifies itself as “financial 

advisor and investor specializing in sovereign debt obligations in 

emerging markets.” 

FG Hemisphere then moved to execute on the DRC’s 

“commercial property . . . in the United States.” Motion for 

Permission to Execute on Judgment and Memorandum in 

Support Thereof at 5 (Nov. 30, 2004). The motion mentioned no 

specific “commercial” properties. On March 14, 2005, FG 

Hemisphere filed an amended motion (“Motion to Execute”) 

seeking to execute on two pieces of DRC real property in 

Washington, DC: 4001 Linnean Avenue, NW, and 5015 

Glenbrook Road, NW. Zaire had originally bought both 

properties to serve as diplomatic residences. The DRC’s 

Ambassador, Oscar Tatanene Manata, lived in the Linnean 

property during his ambassadorship (1990-95) and continued 

there after he lost his position, leaving only in 2005. The DRC 

Military Attaché lived in the Glenbrook property until 1993, 

when he was dismissed and moved out; at that point the 

similarly dismissed DRC Deputy Military Attaché (1988-1993), 

Elinga Simoke Atembina, either continued to live there or 

moved in. Compare Decl. of Faida Mitifu ¶ 6 (May 31, 2005) 

(“Atembina refused to vacate the Glenbrook property when his 

services were terminated”) with Appellant’s Br. at 7 (“[A]fter 

the Glenbrook property was vacated by the Congolese Defense 

and Army Forces Attaché, Mr. Atembina and his family moved 

into the residence”). Both Manata and Atembina remained as 

squatters for over ten years, at least in part as leverage to secure 

past salaries for diplomatic service. See Manata’s Motion to 

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Intervene at 3-4 (May 2, 2005) (noting DRC judicial judgment 

that Manata family has a “right of occupancy [in the Linnean 

property] until the full payment of their salaries and benefits”); 

Aff. of Manata at 2 (Apr. 29, 2005) (noting that “I [Manata] 

have not been paid in fourteen years . . . . I must and will remain 

in this home until the [DRC] settles with me”); Atembina’s 

Motion to Intervene at 2 (May 9, 2005) (noting that “Atembina 

Family’s occupancy is employment right as long as [the DRC] 

will keep them abroad until the full payment of their salaries and 

benefits [sic]”); Mem. Order at 2, Democratic Republic of 

Congo v. Atembina, No. LTB05-18459 (D.C. Super. Ct., Jan. 3, 

2006) (filed in DRC’s Rule 28(j) Letter, Feb. 7, 2006) (noting 

that Atembina asserts “a right to remain in the Glenbrook 

property until he is paid salary that he claims is due him”). Over 

the years the DRC made some efforts to evict them, including a 

request that the power company cut off electricity for the 

Linnean address. It finally regained possession of the Linnean 

property from Manata in 2005 and obtained an eviction order 

against Atembina in 2006. 

On filing the Motion to Execute, FG Hemisphere arranged 

to deliver it by DHL courier service to the DRC. On March 

22—eight days after the motion was filed—the mail department 

in the DRC Foreign Ministry’s Office of Protocol received and 

signed for the DHL package in Kinshasa, the DRC capital. As 

delivered, the motion was in English; the DRC’s official 

language is French. Two days later, the district court granted the 

Motion to Execute (“March 24 Order”). 

Meanwhile, in Kinshasa the DHL package made its 

bureaucratic rounds. It went first to the Bureau of Translation, 

and after translation into French, on to SNEL. SNEL forwarded 

the package to the Office of Protocol, from which it went first to 

the Office of Legal Affairs and then, in late May, to the Foreign 

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Minister’s Chief of Staff. For reasons that aren’t entirely clear, 

ex-ambassador Manata learned of the Motion and phoned to 

alert the Chief of Staff before it arrived in his Kinshasa office. 

On May 4, evidently no more than a day after the alert from 

Manata, the current Ambassador of the DRC, Faida Mitifu, was 

directed to secure counsel. This was more than 40 days after the 

district court granted the Motion to Execute and, of course, 

before receipt of the Motion by the Chief of Staff. 

The DRC then (1) moved to quash the writs of execution on 

May 31, (2) filed a Rule 60(b) motion to vacate the March 24 

Order on July 7, and (3) filed a Rule 62 motion to stay the 

execution on July 8. On August 11—the same day that the 

United States filed a Statement of Interest—the district court 

denied the DRC’s three motions without opinion. The DRC 

appeals, arguing that the district court erred because (1) the 

March 24 Order was void under Rule 60(b)(4) for lack of 

jurisdiction and/or notice, and (2) the DRC’s delay in its 

response to the Motion to Execute qualified as excusable neglect 

under Rule 60(b)(1). 

We review the district court’s denial of the Rule 60(b) 

motion for abuse of discretion. See Hall v. C.I.A., 437 F.3d 94, 

99 (D.C. Cir. 2006); Lepkowski v. United States Dept. of 

Treasury, 804 F.2d 1310, 1311-12 (D.C. Cir. 1986). Because 

the district court provided no explanation for its denial of the 

DRC’s motion, we face several possibilities: either the district 

court found the DRC’s neglect inexcusable, and/or it remained 

unpersuaded by the DRC’s position on the merits. Because we 

find that the district court abused its discretion insofar as it may 

have failed to find the DRC’s neglect excusable, we do not reach 

the issue of whether the judgment was void. 

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* * * 

Rule 60(b)(1) provides that a court may relieve a party from 

a final judgment for “mistake, inadvertence, surprise, or 

excusable neglect.” FED. R. CIV. P. 60(b)(1). In Pioneer 

Investment Services Co. v. Brunswick Associates Ltd. 

Partnership, 507 U.S. 380 (1993), the Supreme Court held that 

the determination of excusable neglect is an equitable matter and 

identified several relevant factors: the risk of prejudice to the 

non-movant, the length of delay, the reason for the delay, 

including whether it was in control of the movant, and whether 

the movant acted in good faith. Id. at 395-97. While Pioneer

involved “excusable neglect” under Bankruptcy Rule 

9006(b)(1), cf. id. at 393-95, the same test governs our 

determination under Rule 60(b)(1). See, e.g., In re Vitamins 

Antitrust Class Actions, 327 F.3d 1207, 1209-10 (D.C. Cir. 

2003). Though the United States as amicus argues excusable 

neglect in more detail than the DRC, the latter’s opening brief 

clearly preserved the issue. See Kamen v. Kemper Financial 

Services, Inc., 500 U.S. 90, 99 (1991). 

The factors listed by Pioneer are of course not exclusive. 

See Pioneer, 507 U.S. at 395-96; Robb v. Norfolk & Western Ry. 

Co., 122 F.3d 354, 362 (7th Cir. 1997). In a case applying other 

sections of Rule 60(b), we’ve stressed a foreign sovereign’s 

interest—and our interest in protecting that interest—in being 

able to assert defenses based on its sovereign status. “Intolerant 

adherence to default judgments against foreign states could 

adversely affect this nation’s relations with other nations and 

undermine the State Department’s continuing efforts to 

encourage foreign sovereigns generally to resolve disputes 

within the United States’ legal framework.” Practical Concepts 

Inc. v. Republic of Bolivia, 811 F.2d 1543, 1551 n.19 (D.C. Cir. 

1987) (Ruth Bader Ginsburg, J.) (internal quotation, brackets, 

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and ellipsis omitted). See also Pulliam v. Pulliam, 478 F.2d 935, 

936 (D.C. Cir. 1973) (noting that in the context of a default 

judgment “a court should liberally allow relief under” Rule 

60(b) because “a resolution on the merits is preferable to a 

judgment by default”); Meadows v. Dominican Republic, 817 

F.2d 517, 521 (9th Cir. 1987) (noting that “default judgments are 

generally disfavored”); Pena v. Seguros La Comercial, S.A., 770 

F.2d 811, 814 (9th Cir. 1985) (same); C.K.S. Engineers, Inc. v. 

White Mountain Gypsum Co., 726 F.2d 1202, 1206 (7th Cir. 

1984) (finding that “rule 60(b) is applied liberally in the default 

judgment context only in the exceptional circumstance” where 

default was not in “the meaningful control” of the moving 

party). 

Apart from the United States’s interest in assuring foreign 

nations’ ability to rely on the U.S. courts, the express Pioneer

factors favor the DRC. The duration of the delay, to be sure, is 

hard to calculate because of uncertainty over when the starting 

shot was fired—that is, when the DRC received the relevant 

notice. FG Hemisphere suggests that delay should be measured 

from September 2004, when the DRC defaulted in the action to 

enforce the arbitral award—a point in time, of course, when 

there had been no mention of executing on the diplomatic 

properties. It relies on Rule 5, which says “[n]o service need be 

made on parties in default for failure to appear except that 

pleadings asserting new or additional claims for relief against 

them shall be served upon them in the manner provided for 

service of summons in Rule 4.” FED. R. CIV. P. 5(a). The DRC 

and the United States as amicus want to use the March 14, 2005 

filing of the Motion to Execute as the starting point. They argue, 

moreover, that the attempt to execute against the diplomatic 

properties is a new claim for relief within the meaning of Rule 

5(a), thus triggering the rule’s reference to Rule 4 (and thus, 

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under Rule 4(j)(1), to the service provisions of the Foreign 

Sovereign Immunities Act (“FSIA”), 28 U.S.C. § 1608). 

We do not here decide whether the attempt to reach the 

diplomatic residences qualifies as a new claim under Rule 5(a). 

In resolving the equitable question under Rule 60(b)(1), 

however, we think it appropriate to use the time the Motion to 

Execute was filed, as that represented the first time that the DRC 

received the slightest hint that its diplomatic properties were in 

jeopardy. As we said in Practical Concepts, quoting language 

drawn from the brief of the United States in that case, when a 

foreign government “has appeared and asserts legal defenses, 

albeit after a default judgment has been entered, it is important 

that those defenses be considered carefully and, if possible, that 

the dispute be resolved on the basis of . . . all relevant legal 

arguments.” 811 F.2d at 1552. The context of the language 

underscores its force; we used it to explain our decision to give 

the foreign government an extra chance to establish its 

jurisdictional immunity under FSIA—even after having just 

found no substantial basis for immunity. 811 F.2d at 1551. 

With the Motion to Execute as the starting point, the 

roughly two month delay between the deadline to respond to the 

Motion and the DRC’s response (and two-and-a-half month 

delay between the Motion’s filing and DRC’s response) was 

relatively short, especially in light of the distance between the 

DRC and the U.S. On brief amicus United States, Br. at 26-27, 

and FG Hemisphere, Br. at 19 n.7, appear to assume that the 

DRC was entitled to 14 days to respond to the March 14, 2005 

motion.1

 Of those 14 days, it took eight simply for the DHL 

 

1

 Local rules call for response to a motion within “11 days of the 

date of service [of a motion] or at such other time as the Court may 

direct, an opposing party shall serve and file a memorandum of points 

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package to be delivered to the DRC. Had the DRC used the 

same courier service, its response could easily have taken 

another eight days, until well after the district court ruled. 

Moreover, the DRC secured counsel only one day after receiving 

its first actual notice, filing its motion to quash less than four 

weeks later. 

In light of the difficulties, the delay period doesn’t seem 

long in relation to the benchmarks of the rather limited set of 

cases (none of which, so far as we’ve discovered, involves 

comparable international distance complications). See, e.g., 

Bateman v. U.S. Postal Service, 231 F.3d 1220, 1225 (9th Cir. 

2000) (finding excusable neglect when delay was over one 

month because plaintiff left country on a family emergency); cf. 

Smith v. District of Columbia, 430 F.3d 450, 456 n.5 (D.C. Cir. 

2005) (noting that delay of “well over a year” militated against 

finding excusable neglect). 

Second, there is no danger of prejudice to FG Hemisphere. 

Prejudice under Rule 60(b)(1) appears typically and properly to 

contemplate costs that reconsideration of the final judgment 

would inflict on the non-moving party independent of the chance 

of reversal. See, e.g., Bateman, 231 F.3d at 1224-25. Pigford v. 

Johanns, 416 F.3d 12, 20-22 (D.C. Cir. 2005), is not to the 

contrary. There, in ruling on courts’ Rule 60(b)(5) power to 

modify an order in light of changed circumstances, we referred 

to excusable neglect by way of analogy and noted that relaxing a 

 

and authorities in opposition to the motion.” LCvR 7(b) (emphasis 

added). Assuming in favor of FG Hemisphere that service occurred at 

dispatch rather than delivery, and adding three days under Rule 6(e) 

for cases where service has been by mail under Rule 5(b)(2)(B), would 

yield March 28, 2005 as the due date for a response. 

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consent decree’s deadline would lead “the government to be 

prejudiced to the tune of almost one million dollars.” Given our 

concern in Pigford about protecting the benefit of the 

government’s bargain (in which the firm deadline was 

presumably agreed on in consideration for offsetting benefits for 

the claimants), Pigford cannot be read as making simple 

exposure to adjudication a qualifying form of prejudice under 

Rule 60(b)(1). See id. at 21 (“If the district court had granted 

the requested relief from the deadlines, the government would 

have lost the benefit of its bargain. . . .”). Reliance interests 

control. 

Here, FG Hemisphere used the delay period to appraise and 

make arrangements to auction off the properties. But these costs 

appear negligible—FG Hemisphere’s brief makes no effort to 

quantify them or otherwise show their significance. Besides, the 

DRC in the trial court offered to compensate FG Hemisphere for 

its expenses in having the writs executed and the properties 

appraised. See Defendant the Democratic Republic of the 

Congo’s Reply to Plaintiff’s Response to Emergency Motion to 

Quash March 24, 2005, Writs of Execution at 18-19 (July 30, 

2005). Cf. Smith, 430 F.3d at 457 n.5 (noting that “the award of 

costs and attorney’s fees was aimed at remedying . . . 

prejudice.”). Reconsideration imposes no cognizable prejudice 

on FG Hemisphere. 

Third, the failure to file a timely response was in 

considerable measure out of the DRC’s control. The movant’s 

use of English rather than French virtually guaranteed the 

DRC’s inability to file a timely response. Although we do not 

rule on the argument that service should have been governed by 

FSIA’s service provision, 28 U.S.C. § 1608(a), we note that 

§ 1608(a) calls for translation by the serving party, thus 

facilitating the sovereign’s ability to make a timely response and 

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tending in part to overcome what Practical Concepts recognized 

as the “perils of converting the legal terms and concepts of one 

system into those of another.” 811 F.2d at 1546. The absence of 

translation is comparable to the placement of the claim-filing 

deadline at the bottom of a letter entitled “Notice for Meeting of 

Creditors,” an obscurity that the Pioneer Court found to militate 

in favor of creditors who had missed the deadline. 507 U.S. at 

398-99. Further, it seems likely that much of the Motion’s 

bouncing around the various departments within the DRC was 

due to substantial political and institutional differences between 

the United States and the DRC, which Practical Concepts

exhorts us to consider. See 811 F.2d at 1546. Finally, of course, 

the DRC was plainly hampered by its devastating civil war, 

which cost over three million lives, shattered the DRC’s already 

shaky political structure, and set off hyperinflation that peaked at 

over 500% per year in 2000. It is not surprising that the war 

would be accompanied by substantial confusion over 

responsibilities in the Foreign Ministry—indeed the Office of 

the Foreign Minister itself appears not to have any record of 

receiving the Motion. Cf. Brenner v. Shore, 297 N.E.2d 550, 

553-54 (Ohio Ct. App. 1973) (vacating default judgment under 

parallel state rule 60(b)(1) because of “complete physical and 

mental collapse” of defendant). 

FG Hemisphere points to the facts that the DRC sold 

electricity to neighboring countries, that DRC President Kabila 

visited East Asia with an entourage of 200 people, and that the 

DRC sent a delegation to Pope John Paul II’s funeral, arguing 

that each of these supports a finding that DRC’s neglect was 

inexcusable. But a polity’s ability to fund foreign travel for its 

chief executive and other officials is hardly evidence of the sort 

of general state capacity that would make for swift and efficient 

handling of a DHL package with English-language materials. 

The delay here, then, seems like the sort of innocent neglect that 

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in the absence of prejudice or bad faith commonly qualifies as 

excusable. See, e.g., Walter v. Blue Cross & Blue Shield United 

of Wisconsin, 181 F.3d 1198, 1201-02 (11th Cir. 1999) (finding 

excusable neglect in secretary’s clerical error in failing to record 

deadline). 

FG Hemisphere itself seems virtually to admit as much, see 

Oral Arg. Tape at 49:02 (conceding that “it is a record . . . [from] 

which one could conclude that it was excusable neglect.”), in the 

end relying mainly on a number of points apparently thought to 

show the DRC’s bad faith—the fourth express Pioneer factor. 

See Pioneer, 507 U.S. at 398; Robb, 122 F.3d at 362. For 

example, it notes that the DRC participated actively in two 

litigations in the United Kingdom and Belgium. FG Hemisphere 

doesn’t explain why an erratic litigation record supports an 

inference of bad faith. In fact, preoccupation with other 

litigation may even strengthen a finding of excusable neglect. 

See, e.g., Kryzak v. Dresser Industries, 118 F.R.D. 12, 13-14 (D. 

Me. 1987); see also WRIGHT, MILLER & KANE, FEDERAL 

PRACTICE AND PROCEDURE: CIVIL 2D § 2858 at 270-71 (“Relief 

has been given from a default suffered through the excusable 

neglect of counsel preoccupied with other litigation.”). 

Along the same lines FG Hemisphere argues that the DRC 

has engaged in a systematic litigation strategy aimed at 

frustrating creditors by artificial claims of diplomatic immunity. 

It points to the Belgian suit, where the court found immunity for 

a property formerly used by diplomatic personnel and allegedly 

under renovation to serve as the ambassador’s residence. Two 

months after the court’s ruling the DRC sold the property. We 

have no basis for trying to sort out the merits of this Belgian 

conflict, and fail to see how, even on the worst assumptions, it 

could show strategic behavior in the DRC’s defaulting in its 

response to the Motion to Execute. 

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FG Hemisphere also espies chicanery in the contrast 

between the DRC’s hiring of attorneys within one day of exambassador Manata’s telling the foreign ministry of the order to 

execute, and its earlier failure to participate in the litigation. FG 

Hemisphere doesn’t explain why this might show bad faith 

rather than (at worst) rather chaotic neglect. And even if there 

was “strategy” in defaulting on the merits but resisting the 

execution, the strategy may have been simply to fight on issues 

where its merits position was strong; this is hardly reprehensible.

Finally, our cases (and those of other circuits) antedating 

Pioneer generally required a party seeking relief on grounds of 

excusable neglect to assert a potentially meritorious defense. 

See, e.g., Lepkowski, 804 F.2d at 1314; Combs v. Nick Garin 

Trucking, 825 F.2d 437, 441-42 (D.C. Cir. 1987); Falk v. Allen, 

739 F.2d 461, 463 (9th Cir. 1984); Gross v. Stereo Component 

Systems, Inc., 700 F.2d 120, 122 (3d Cir. 1983). Since then 

other circuits have held, without much explanation, that the 

requirement survives Pioneer, even though that decision 

mentions no such criterion. See, e.g., Johnson v. Dayton Elec. 

Mfg. Co., 140 F.3d 781, 784 (8th Cir. 1998) (“[W]e believe the 

existence of a meritorious defense continues to be a relevant 

factor after Pioneer.”); TCI Group Life Ins. Plan v. Knoebber, 

244 F.3d 691, 696-97 (9th Cir. 2001) (noting that pre-Pioneer

factors of culpable conduct, meritorious defense, and prejudice 

are “quite sufficient after Pioneer . . . to guide district courts’ 

exercise of discretion under Rule 60(b)(1) in the context of 

default judgments”). Of course Pioneer’s list of factors was 

non-exclusive. And the requirement advances judicial economy: 

if the 60(b)(1) movant’s substantive claim is plainly meritless, 

there seems little point in a nuanced treatment of data bearing on 

the excusability of the movant’s neglect. Indeed, in a postPioneer case, we held that a potentially meritorious defense is a 

precondition for Rule 60(b) relief (without discussion of 

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Pioneer), reasoning that the movant must show “that vacating 

the judgment will not be an empty exercise or a futile gesture.” 

Murray v. District of Columbia, 52 F.3d 353, 355-56 (D.C. Cir. 

1995). 

The DRC has met easily that standard. Under the FSIA the 

property of a foreign state is immune from execution subject to 

certain exceptions, 28 U.S.C. § 1609, the one asserted by FG 

Hemisphere being use of the property “for a commercial activity 

in the United States.” 28 U.S.C. § 1610(a). See also 28 U.S.C. 

§ 1603(d) (defining commercial activity as “a regular course of 

commercial conduct or a particular commercial transaction or 

act”); Republic of Argentina v. Weltover, Inc., 504 U.S. 607, 614 

(1992) (concluding “that when a foreign government acts . . . in 

the manner of a private player within [a market], the foreign 

sovereign’s actions are ‘commercial’ within the meaning of the 

FSIA”). While FG Hemisphere bears the burden of producing 

evidence to show that immunity should not be granted, the DRC 

bears the ultimate burden of persuasion (i.e., to show that the 

commercial-activity exception does not apply). See Princz v. 

Federal Republic of Germany, 26 F.3d 1166, 1171 (D.C. Cir. 

1994); Robinson v. Government of Malaysia, 269 F.3d 133, 141 

(2d Cir. 2001). FG Hemisphere asserts that the commercial 

activity exception applies to the two dwellings because they 

have been occupied by persons other than accredited diplomats 

for over ten years and thus, FG Hemisphere asserts, are 

presumably held as “investment[s] in a rapidly-appreciating real 

estate market.” 

We are unconvinced. The fact that former diplomats 

squatted on the properties says little. FG Hemisphere’s labeling 

the DRC as canny is implausible; the DRC entirely failed to 

collect rent on the properties for over a decade. FG Hemisphere 

counters that this was a payoff to the former diplomats and 

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hence a form of imputed rent to the DRC. But the far more 

likely explanation for the failure to pursue the squatters is that 

the DRC’s political condition (including civil war) disabled its 

government from effectively protecting the state’s interests. It 

appears undisputed that the Glenbrook and Linnean sites have 

been and are intended to be used as diplomatic residencies of 

DRC officials. Both the State Department and the District of 

Columbia have recognized the properties as diplomatic—and do 

so to this day. While the holdover diplomats may have invoked 

non-payment of wages to justify squatting, there is nothing to 

show that the DRC conceived of the relation as an indirect way 

of providing compensation. (We pass no judgment on whether, 

if such a relation existed, it would qualify as commercial.) So 

far as the record now appears, there is thus no evidentiary basis 

for believing that the properties have been “used for a 

commercial activity.” 

Because we find that the DRC’s neglect was excusable and 

that the DRC’s claim of immunity is potentially meritorious, we 

reverse the district court’s denial of the DRC’s Rule 60(b) 

motion and vacate the March 24 Order. As the DRC’s neglect is 

excused, the district court must consider the merits as it would 

have if the DRC had filed a timely response. We thus remand 

for further proceedings on the merits. 

 So ordered.

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