OLG Oldenburg; 2016-04-18; 13 U 43/15
Decision by national courts in the field of European Union law — ECLI:DE:OLGOL:2016:0418.13U43.15.0A
Date: 2016-04-18
Subject matter: Judicial cooperation in civil matters
Origin: Germany

82016DE0418(51)_ENG_SUMJURE
JURE summary
JURE summary
The dispute concerns the admissibility of an action for damages against Greece for the restructuring of government bonds and the international jurisdiction of German courts, on which the Oberlandesgericht Oldenburg (hereinafter ‘the Court of Appeal’) ruled.
The plaintiffs are claiming payment from Greece (hereinafter ‘the defendant’) in respect of government bonds that had to be forcibly exchanged for new government bonds with a lower nominal value during the Greek debt crisis in March 2012.
In the course of Greece's debt crisis, the Greek government issued instructions to the Greek central bank to carry out the forced exchange. This was done in such a way that, on 12 March 2012, the old bonds were deregistered by the system maintained by the Central Bank of Greece and, at the same time, the new bonds were registered. As a result, the old bonds were also written off in the plaintiff’s custody accounts and the new bonds with a lower nominal value were registered simultaneously. The plaintiffs claim the nominal value of their original bonds plus interest.
The Landgericht Osnabrück (hereinafter referred to as ‘the Court of First Instance’) dismissed the action as inadmissible and stated as grounds that the legal dispute was not subject to German jurisdiction because the defendant enjoys state immunity.
The scope of application of the Brussels I Regulation (1) encompasses the plaintiff’s claim satisfaction of claims arising from the government bonds at hand. The case is a civil and commercial matter within the meaning of Article 1(1) of the Brussels I Regulation. This is because the matter in dispute for performance is of civil law nature and not subject to public law, and the raising of capital through the issuance of government bonds can be classified as non-sovereign action.
The Court of Appeal considers that the German courts do not have international and local jurisdiction under Article 5(3) of the Brussels I Regulation. A precondition for the application of this provision would be that the subject-matter of the proceedings was a tort, delict or quasi-delict or claims resulting from such an act. In this respect, only the claims for damages for Intentional damage contrary to public policy or for unlawful expropriation or an expropriation-equivalent encroachment, which are alternatively asserted with the claim, come into consideration. However, according to the principle of state immunity, these claims cannot be assessed by German courts.
The Court of Appeal decided to dismiss the plaintiff’s appeal.
(1) Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters.