If international contracts are concluded online, they sometimes lack an unambiguous nexus to a specific jurisdiction. Sometimes, this makes it difficult to determinate the competent court. In a recent case involving a German customer, Air France and flights from the United States to France and then on to the UK, the lower German courts found that they had no jurisdiction. It was for the Federal Supreme Court (Bundesgerichtshof) to provide clarity: It found that the Frankfurt District Court (Landgericht) had jurisdiction after all. Continue reading
“Africa in the Moot” and the Spirit of the Vis Moot
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At the Willem C. Vis Moot, “the” moot competition in international commercial arbitration, the Michael L. Sher Award for the Spirit of the Willem C. Vis Moot is “awarded to a team or an individual student for its dedication and commitment to the Spirit of the Vis Moot.” This year, the award went to the University Eduardo Mondlane’s team from Maputo, Mozambique. Continue reading
Post-Brexit UK Accession to Lugano Convention: The EU Commission’s Assessment
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There has been a fair amount of speculation about the EU’s position regarding the application of the United Kingdom to accede to the 2007 Lugano, and we have tracked the topic fairly closely on the blog, including the latest press reports that the EU Commission might have changed its approach. Continue reading
The Month in Retrospect: What Else Happened in April 2021
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Some Back and Forth on Brexit and Lugano
On 8 April 2021, I covered the first anniversay of the UK’s application to join the Lugano Convention, and took a fairly pessimistic view as to the prospects of the UK becoming a member state. So I was quite surprised to see a headline in the Financial Times on 12 April 2021 that claimed: “UK set to secure Brussels’ backing for joining legal pact“. The FT’s sources apparently got it wrong, however, and a couple of hours later the FT had to retract its report: “Brussels opposes UK bid to join legal pact, splitting EU states – European Commission says Britain should not be allowed to rejoin Lugano convention.” Other sources such as Sueddeutsche Zeitung confirm that there had been no change in the EU Commission’s policy – there is no prospect of the UK joining Lugano any time soon. Continue reading
Brexit and Lugano: First Anniversary of the UK’s Application
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On 8 April 2020, the United Kingdom deposited an application to accede to the Lugano Convention, with the Swiss Federal Council, the depositary under the Convention. Acceding to the Lugano Convention as a replacement for the Brussels Regulation (recast) had emerged as the UK’s preferred strategy for judicial co-operation in civil and commercial matters (even though the European Court of Justice does have a role in the Lugano regime under Protocol 2 on the uniform interpretation of the Convention and on the Standing Committee). Continue reading