ddrg/super_eurlex huggingface dataset:
JURE summary



JURE summary

An Austrian plaintiff initiated divorce proceedings including maintenance claims in India as her permanent residence. Hereupon, her spouse, the defendant filed for divorce in Austria as his permanent residence whereupon the plaintiff brought an action of maintenance in the form of an action by stages. According to the defendant’s plea, the maintenance action should be rejected due to lack of international competence and the pending international dispute. The Court of first instance rejected the defendant’s plea and the Court of Appeal upheld this decision. However, the revision to the appeal is admissible.

The lower courts deal with the interpretation of the provisions of Article 12 of Council Regulation (EC) No 4/2009 on jurisdiction, applicable law, recognition and enforcement of decisions and cooperation in matters relating to maintenance obligations It is debatable whether the application of the scheme of the pendency of law in Article 12 of Regulation (EC) No 4/2009 is excluded by a negative forecast for the recognition of a foreign maintenance title (divorce proceedings in India) as, relating to the matter, the proceedings were pending in India already. According to the Court of Appeal, Supreme Court case law does not exist yet.

The defendant and the Court of Appeal consider that the interpretation of a forecast of recognition is a significant question of law, which constitutes a reason for the appeal. However, plaintiff claimed that no significant legal question was put forward.

The Supreme Court of Justice - Oberster Gerichtshof (hereinafter “OGH”) did not share the Court of Appeals’ view that the interpretation of a recognition forecasting was a decision-relevant significant legal question within the meaning of § 528(1) of the Code of civil procedure and that there was reason for the appeal.

As the OGH suggests by its decision, the plaintiffs or defendants must show a substantial question of law. But in this case, the defendant contends only reasons such as the handling of, which does not depend on a significant issue. Thus, the appeal must be rejected, regardless of the statement of admissibility (see resolution 8 Ob 111/14b).

Apart from this, there is extensive case-law for the interpretation of Article 27 of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001, Article 29 of Regulation (EU) No 1215/2012 and Article 19 of Regulation (EC) No 2201/2003, which are very similar to Article 12 of Regulation (EC) No 4/2009 in terms of content.

The OGH decided that the defendant’s appeal must be rejected due to the lack of demonstration of a substantial question of law.
JURE summary



JURE summary

- Even if confirmed by the Court of Appeal with double compliance, the First Instance's decision regarding the matter of international jurisdiction, even if resulting from a private agreement on jurisdiction, is subject to appeal to the Supreme Court of Justice.

- Although the violation of the private agreement of jurisdiction causes the absolute incompetence of the Court, it is not, under national civil procedural law, a matter to be brought up by the court independently, without the prior request of the parties.

- Although Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 does not demand any connection between the object of litigation and the designated court, the case must have points of contact within more than one country.

- In this specific case, the Plaintiff and the Defendant agreed that the Defendant should act as a Multibranch Party, allowing it to make transactions through its branches in London and Luxembourg, meaning that they agreed that the Defendant could carry out financial operations in the international market, within its actions of the party to the swap contract.

- Therefore, it is concluded that these specific swap contracts are related to more than one national legal framework, by which the internationality of the legal relationship is proved and the preconditions for the application of Article 23(1) of the Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 are fulfilled.
JURE summary



JURE summary

I - As a consequence of the principle of territoriality of enforcement, each State has a monopoly on coercive measures carried out within its territory.

II - As legal realities devoid of physical form, the right to receive benefits is not located in any particular place; one may, if anything, refer to their place of fulfilment.

III - In the absence of a valid agreement to attribute jurisdiction/competence and, considering the aforementioned paragraph I, Portuguese courts are not internationally competent to order the urgent judicial seizure of a credit titled by a Portuguese company, as contractor, over another company with it’s address in Israel and owner of the construction built in that country.

IV - The notification of the Israeli debtor company, presupposed in III, could also not be carried out according to the "Hague Convention, of 15.11.65, on the Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents in Civil or Commercial Matters".
JURE summary



JURE summary

1. A judicial ruling which invites the parties to offer their arguments, if they so wish, supposedly in order to avoid issuing a surprise ruling, must offer a minimum indication of what matter may constitute the "surprise" in question, or else it risks grossly violating the basic principles of the adversarial system.

2. The invitation made by the court for the parties to perfect their previous petitions is not a procedural means to bring completely new facts into the case, but only to allow the facts claimed by the parties to be rid of shortcomings and or lacks of precision or to be made clearer, always assuming that they are legally relevant in the light of the various solutions plausible for the legal issues.

3. The first part of Article 32(1) of the Convention on the Contract for the International Carriage of Goods by Road (CMR) does not conflict with European Union Law.
JURE summary



JURE summary

I. The preliminary analysis foreseen in Article 8 of Regulation (EC) No 1896/2006 is perfunctory, intended only to verify if the data included in the Form fulfils the prerequisites of a European order for payment procedure, namely jurisdiction, and does not require the intervention of a judge. However, even if a judge carries it out in generic terms, it is not considered a formal definitive judicial ruling which might prevent or prevail over the later concrete appreciation of the matter.

II. Under the terms of the abovementioned Regulation, the prerequisites are considered to have been fulfilled, as long as they are filled out by the applicant in the Form submitted by the applicant. Such is the case of the prerequisite of the court's international jurisdiction: all that is necessary is to indicate in the Form the option regarding the agreement of the parties.

III. The general rule of Article 2 of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 is that persons domiciled in a Member State are to be sued, regardless of their nationality, before the courts of that Member State. However, Article 3(1) foresees situations in which cases against such persons can be tried before the courts of another Member State (Sections 2 through 7 of Chapter II).

IV. One of these situations is in the existence of an agreement between the parties (Article 23(1)). Another is that, in matters of contract law, the place where the obligation was or shall be fulfilled is a relevant factor of connection. In the case of the sale of goods, the place in question is where, under the contract, the goods were or should have been delivered - unless agreed otherwise.

V. This agreement has as object the place of fulfilment of the obligation (Article 5(1)b)) and is not to be confused with the agreement on jurisdiction (Article 23(1)), which is exclusive (unless agreed otherwise).

VI. Although the agreement on jurisdiction should obey certain formalities, these do not have to be proven to have been met in Form A and the lack of formalities does not allow the judge to ignore the agreement on jurisdiction. If the court deems it relevant, namely after the defendant has been validly notified of the court case, to ascertain whether the agreement exists and is valid, then the court should notify the party which invoked the agreement to supply proof.

VII. The fact that, following the notification of the defendant, a document was submitted to the case in a foreign language, is not enough to conclude that the jurisdiction of the court has been tacitly accepted, under Article 24 of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001.

VIII. The place of fulfilment of the obligation, when it regards a movable asset, is, unless agreed otherwise or otherwise legally stipulated, the place where the asset was in the moment the deal was completed or the place where it was produced (Article 772(1) and Article 773(1) and (2) of the Portuguese Código Civil).

IX. If Article 5(1)(b) of the Regulation is not applicable, then point (a) of the same rule applies, in this case together with Article 774 and Article 885(2) of the Código Civil (regarding place of payment).
JURE summary



JURE summary

I - If the court case arises from a legal relationship with points of contact in several countries, regarding commercial matters with connection to the territory of EU Member States, and at least one of the parties is domiciled in one of the Member States, international jurisdiction to hear the case is determined by Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22.12.2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters.

II. Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 is directly applicable to court cases included in its scope in terms of territory, matter and time. The Regulation prevails over internal national rules, and precludes their application, namely regarding the prerequisites of validity of agreements on jurisdiction which are not foreseen in the Regulation.

III. Under the terms of Regulation (EC) No 593/2008 of 17.06.2008 on the law applicable to contractual obligations (Rome I), contracts shall be governed by the law chosen by the parties and the existence and validity of a contract, or of any term of a contract, shall be determined by the law which would govern it under this Regulation if the contract or term were valid.

IV. The notion of agreement on jurisdiction under Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 is autonomous in relation to national law of Member States, therefore, its prerequisites are strictly those listed in the Regulation. Their validity does not depend on any connection between the object of the dispute and the appointed court or any relevant interest in its location.

V. Considering that Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 does not require the fulfilment of the prerequisite mentioned in Article 99(3)(c) of the Portuguese Código de Processo Civil, in order for an agreement on jurisdiction to be valid, this prerequisite may not be required by means of any other rule of national law, namely the national law on general contractual clauses.

VI. In a contract signed between entrepreneurs or equivalent entities, the validity of the agreement on jurisdiction is analysed exclusively under the terms of Article 23 of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001. The national law on general contractual clauses is not applicable, even though the clause which contains the agreement on jurisdiction may, itself, be subject to this regime.

VII. Article 24 of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 contains an extension of jurisdiction, not a reduction. Therefore, presenting a case before a court other than the one foreseen in the jurisdiction agreement does not imply a tacit waiver of the agreement regarding future court cases.

VIII. The party which presents a case before a court other than the one foreseen in the jurisdiction agreement and then, after being notified of a court action presented by the then defendant in a court of the same Member State, argues that the court is incompetent, because it was not the court chosen in the jurisdiction agreement, is not acting in abuse of rights, since the jurisdiction of the court action presented by the party was only made definitive because the defendant appeared and presented a defence, without arguing incompetence, thereby extending jurisdiction.
JURE summary



JURE summary

The case concerns a cassation examined by the Polish Supreme Court against an order of the Appeal Court. The Appeal Court dismissed the claim for a compensation payment brought by a small entrepreneur located in Poland against a company with a statutory seat in Austria, with whom the claimant was in permanent business relations under the civil law cooperation contract.

Relevant law: Article 23 of the Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters (“Brussels I Regulation”).

Under the provisions of the Polish Act of 16 April 1993 r. on Fair Trading (o zwalczaniu nieuczciwej konkurencji), the claimant contested an alleged act of unfair competition on the part of the defendant and claimed the compensation payment under the law of tort. The alleged act of unfair competition occurred during a business transaction regulated under a supplementary agreement between the parties. The defendant objected the jurisdiction of the Polish courts under the terms of the general cooperation contract which provided a general jurisdiction clause, reserving jurisdiction in disputes between the parties for the Austrian courts.

The Supreme Court examined several issues brought by the claimant, namely the alleged general invalidity of the clause and the inapplicability of the clause for the specific supplementary agreement between the parties being the basis of the claim and its inapplicability in the case of tort claims. The Supreme Court examined the jurisdiction clause under Article 23 of the Brussels I Regulation and stated that the supplementary agreement and the general cooperation contract created the comprehensive legal regulation for the contested business transaction and, therefore, the jurisdiction clause applied. The Supreme Court noted that in the case of the interpretation of a contractual jurisdiction clause with the view to its application to a specific dispute, and in particular in the case of a dispute concerning a tort claim arising from such a contract, it is important to establish if the parties to the contract could have foreseen the possibility of this type of dispute when concluding the contract or complementing a legal relationship entered into when bound by the rules and condition of the initial contract.

As such was the situation in the case, the Supreme Court dismissed the claim.
JURE summary



JURE summary

1. A clause of a contract signed by the parties which foresees a jurisdiction agreement is valid, from a formal viewpoint, since it obeys the prerequisites set forth by Article 23(1) of Regulation (EC) Regulation No 44/2001, of 22.12.2000, on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matter.

2. The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has already stated (decision in the Castelletti case, issued on 16/03/99), regarding the rule of Article 17 of the Brussels Convention, similar to the rule of Article 23 of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001, that "one of the aims of the Convention, that the national court seised should be able readily to decide whether it has jurisdiction on the basis of the rules of the Convention, without having to consider the substance of the case".

3. Since the uniform interpretation of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 is entrusted to the CJEU (as per Article 267 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union), the Lisbon Court of Appeal should be sensitive to it, and it is justified to adopt the same interpretative criteria.

4. Therefore, the prerequisites for the validity of a jurisdiction agreement can only be those outlined in Article 23 of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001. Any kind of appreciation of validity of the jurisdiction agreement under Portuguese national law, namely Decree Law 446/58, is irrelevant, as long as all rules of EU Law are respected.

5. This would only not be the case if the general contractual clause was part of a contract signed with a consumer, because, under this circumstance, Article 67 of the Regulation indirectly implies that Directive 93/13/EEC of 05/04/1993 on unfair terms in consumer contracts should be taken into account.
JURE summary



JURE summary

1. Under the regime of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001, in order for the choice of the Court to be valid, it is not necessary for there to be any relationship between the object of the litigation and the chosen court; the hypothetical disadvantages, for one of the parties, of the designated Court's location, which might be relevant under national procedural Law, must not be taken into account.

2. The validity of the agreement on jurisdiction, contained in a general contractual clause, integrated in a contract signed between an entrepreneur or similar entity, is analysed exclusively under the terms of Article 23 of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001, and the national legal framework for general contractual clauses shall not apply.

3. If, in reply to the dilatory exception of the lack of international jurisdiction of the Portuguese Courts, matters of fact or evidence are brought up which are not merely matters of Law, the case should be sent to the lower courts, in order for these matters of fact to be subject to proof and analysis, before determining whether the aforementioned exception should proceed or not.

4. Regardless of the precise dogmatic configuration that can be attributed to the duty of procedural management, enshrined in Article 6, and to the principle of formal adequacy, proclaimed by Article 547 of the current Código do Processo Civil (CPC), these principles allow the possibility, in cases of complex disputes, to separate and treat autonomously the relevant matter for the appreciation of a certain dilatory exception, by separating it from the group of matters of fact and evidence which are only relevant for the assessment of merit, so as to carry out a previous production and analysis of evidence, thereby assuring that, in analysing and judging the remaining matters under litigation, one has already previously determined if the court is, or is not able to try the merit of the cause.
JURE summary



JURE summary

The plaintiff, a Czech limited company, brought action for damages against the defendant, an Austrian limited company and their former legal representation, because of flawed conduct of proceedings. The defendant did not prevent the enforceability of a Czech judgment by default in Austria. The Court of first instance dismissed the action because of the statute of limitations. The Court of Appeal upheld the plaintiff’s appeal. The defendant’s revision is directed against this.

The Court of Appeal relies on the provision of Article 34(2) of Council Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22.12.2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters (“Brussels I Regulation”). Please note that it is Regulation that was valid until 09.01.2015 only.

According to this provision, a decision is not recognised if the defendant (in this case the plaintiff in dispute with the judgement by default as a result), by not engaging in the procedure, has not been served the document instituting the proceedings or an equivalent document in sufficient time and in such a way, they could defend themselves.

The Court of Appeal assigned to the first instance the supplement of proceedings as the proceedings on declaration of enforceability had allegedly gone if the defendant had reported particulars on the deprivation of the rights of the defence according to Article 34(2) of the Brussels I Regulation. The plaintiff claims the defendant would have had to explain the reasoning of the refusal according to Article 34(2) of the Brussels I Regulation in more detail, as the subsidiary in Prague had ceased existence not upon formal cancellation in 2006, but already as of 2002, when it ceased to exist at the address registered in the commercial register and therefore, was not able to take note of the summons to the hearing and the judgment by default or to defend themselves.

According to the Supreme Court of Justice - Oberster Gerichtshof (hereinafter “OGH”), in this case, this is not a violation of Article 34(2) of the Brussels I Regulation and the enforceability of the Czech judgment would have been unable to prevent.

Article 34(2) of the Brussels I Regulation assumes that the proceeding’s instituting documents have not been delivered to the defendant in such a way that they were able to defend themselves. According to the OGH, there are enough judgements on this. Even if requirements of delivery have been infringed, it is to be checked whether the delivery error has affected the debtor’s rights of defence from a substantive point of view. The plaintiff did not comply with its duty to inform the commercial register of an address change. Thus, the fictitious delivery is justified.

The OGH decided that the contested judgment is to be changed, granting the revision and that the first-instance’s decision is to be restored to the correct judgement to dismiss the action.
JURE summary



JURE summary

I - According to the terms of Article 38(1) of the Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000 on jurisdiction and the recognition and enforcement of judgments in civil and commercial matters, the judgement given in a Member State and enforceable in that State shall be enforced in another Member State when, on the application of any interested party, it has been declared enforceable there.

II - According to Article 53 of the Regulation: "A party seeking recognition or applying for a declaration of enforceability shall produce a copy of the judgment which satisfies the conditions necessary to establish its authenticity" (Article 53(1)), and shall also produce the certificate referred to in Article 54, without prejudice to Article 55(2).

III - Although the foreign sentence contains a brief justification, that is, an explanation of the reason behind the decision to issue the condemnation contained in the sentence, it is important to note that it is not possible to appreciate the merit of the foreign sentence within the procedure to recognize its enforceability, therefore, nor the court of 1st instance, nor the Porto Court of Appeal are allowed to appreciate if the decision was correct, i.e., if the ruling was in harmony with applicable procedural rules and if it made a correct critical assessment of the available evidence.
JURE summary



JURE summary

I- A swap contract (derivative financial instrument/OTC contract or of negotiation of interest or currency) has incorporated a clause referring to section 13(b)(i) of the framework contract denominated ISDA Master Agreement (template/standard scheme) and Master Agreement Schedule (special applicable clauses) that namely, gives the English courts jurisdictional competence to settle matters related to this type of contracts.

II - Since it is a matter of private law, and the action was brought forth in a Member State of the European Union/EU (Portugal) and the defendant is, also, an EU resident, the present case is covered by Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22-12-2000 and by the new Regulation (EU) No 1215/2012 of 12-12-2012, applicable to civil proceedings after 1-3-2002.

III - Consequently and according to priority of EU Law over our internal Law in these matters (Article 8 of the Constitution of Portuguese Republic (CRP)), the agreement on jurisdiction established between the parties is valid, and according to it, the aforementioned Court (national) is not internationally competent to settle the current litigation.