The latest issue of the Journal of Private International Law (Volume 19, Issue 3) is now available. This issue features eight articles and one book review. Chukwuma Samuel Adesina Okoli and Abubakri Yekini, Implied jurisdiction agreements in international commercial contracts: a global comparative perspective, 321-361 This article examines the principles of implied jurisdiction agreements and […]
A call for papers has recently been issued by Michiel Poesen and Patricia Živković (University of Aberdeen), co-convenors of the Society of Legal Scholars Conflict of Laws section, for the Conflicts section of the SLS Annual Conference 2024 at Bristol University from 3 to 4 September 2024. The theme of the conference is Learning from […]
The third edition of Paul Torremans‘ Intellectual Property and Private International Law has just been published by Oxford University Press in its Private International Law series. The blurb reads: The rapidly developing field of intellectual property and private international law could be difficult to navigate for practitioners and researchers because of the complex interface of […]
On 22 February 2024, the Law Commission of England and Wales published a call for evidence to help them identify the most challenging and prevalent issues of private international law that arise from the digital, online, and decentralised contexts in which modern digital assets and electronic trade documents are used. They seek the views and […]
Litigating in England is expensive. That is why the number of international family law cases is relatively small in this country. However, when an international family law dispute does end up before an English court, it tends to involve very wealthy individuals and can be quite spectacular. One such case is Potanina v Potanin, which […]
On 19 January 2024, the High Court of England and Wales (Dias J) gave a judgment in Border Timbers Ltd v Zimbabwe, which concerned an application to set aside an order granting registration of an ICSID award. The court dismissed the application while holding that the execution of the award was precluded by state immunity. […]
The latest issue of the International & Comparative Law Quarterly (Volume 73, Issue I) is now available. This issue features one article and one book review that focus on private international law. Toni Marzal, The Territorial Reach of European Union Law: A Private International Law Enquiry into the European Union’s Spatial Identity, 29-63 This article […]
On 20 December 2023, the English Court of Appeal gave private international lawyers interested in the relationship between private and public international law a small Christmas treat. It delivered a unanimous judgment (Vos MR, with Popplewell and Phillips LLJ agreeing) in UK P&I Club NV v Republica Bolivariana de Venezuela. This judgment addresses the question, […]
In a post published on 8 June 2023, I introduced Zubaydah v Foreign, Development and Commonwealth Office, a case heard by the UK Supreme Court on 14 and 15 June. Abu Zubaydah, the claimant (respondent in the appeal), has brought a tort claim against the UK government (appellants in the appeal), alleging that MI5 and […]
On 7 November 2023, less than three weeks after the judgment in Limbu v Dyson Technology Ltd (reported here), where the High Court of England and Wales applied the forum non conveniens doctrine to a business and human rights claim, the Inner House of the Scottish Court of Session (Scotland’s supreme civil court) directed around […]
On 23 November 2023, the UK Ministry of Justice published its response to the consultation on whether the UK should sign and ratify the Hague Convention of 2 July 2019 on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Judgments in Civil or Commercial Matters. The Government has concluded that it is the right time for the […]
This post has been written by Jacco Bomhoff (LSE), Uglješa Grušić (UCL), and Manuel Penades (KCL). As previously announced, the LSE Law School hosted a symposium to celebrate the scholarly work of Emeritus Professor Trevor C. Hartley on 17 October 2023. The Symposium brought together around 70 participants, colleagues, and friends from the UK and abroad, […]
The Yukos saga is a gift that keeps on giving. Following the nationalisation of Yukos in 2007, former shareholders commenced a number of arbitral proceedings against Rosneft, which acquired Yukos’ assets, and Russia. Many readers of the blog will know that the English courts have already dealt with an aspect of the Yukos saga. The […]
It does not happen often that an arbitral award is successfully challenged in England for serious irregularity under section 68 of the Arbitration Act 1996. This happens even less often when an award is rendered by a tribunal as prominent as the one in Process and Industrial Developments Ltd v Nigeria, which included Lord Hoffmann […]
Claimants suing multinational enterprises for business-related human rights abuses have recently had a good run in England. The Supreme Court cleared the jurisdictional hurdles for the claimants in Vedanta and Okpabi. This was followed by the Court of Appeal judgment in Begum and the High Court judgment in Josiya, which opened the door for value […]
Where England is not the natural forum for the trial of the substantive dispute, the English court should not, as a matter of policy or law, restrain proceedings in one foreign jurisdiction where the purpose of the injunction is to favour proceedings in another jurisdiction. In other words…it is no part of the function of […]
Alex Mills and I are pleased to announce that, alongside the UCL Faculty of Laws Research Scholarships which are open to all research areas, this year we have an additional scholarship specifically for doctoral research in private international law. The scholarship covers the cost of tuition fees (home status fees) and provides a maintenance stipend […]
That London is a global capital for dispute resolution is well known. But even by London standards, Corinna zu Sayn-Wittgenstein-Sayn v His Majesty Juan Carlos Alfonso Victor Maria De Borbón Y Borbón is a spectacular litigation. Like in all complex international litigation, private international law has a role to play in this case. This is […]
I have already reported that the UK Supreme Court ruled on the meaning of a “matter” in Article II(3) of the 1958 New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (NYC) in its judgment of 20 September 2023 in Republic of Mozambique v Privinvest Shipbuilding SAL (Holding) [2023] UKSC 32. On […]
Article II(3) of the 1958 New York Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (NYC) provides: The court of a Contracting State, when seized of an action in a matter in respect of which the parties have made an agreement within the meaning of this article, shall, at the request of one […]
Jacco Bomhoff (LSE), Manuel Penades (KCL), and I are pleased to announce that the LSE Law School will host a symposium to celebrate the scholarly work of emeritus professor Trevor C. Hartley. Trevor has long been one of the world’s most distinguished scholars of Conflict of Laws (Private International Law), continuing a tradition started at […]
London holds the distinction of being a preferred seat for arbitration, making significant developments in English arbitration law of general interest to arbitration specialists and, at times, private international lawyers. Few developments in arbitration law can match the significance of a reform affecting the statute providing a framework for arbitration. This is precisely what the […]
