208 / 522
anti-suit injunctions against another member state, in any case in which
a party filed a lawsuit in a member state. In the Turner case
6
, the Court
referred to mutual trust as being paramount in its judgment, and stated
that anti-suit injunctions are incompatible with the Brussels
Convention of 1968, and the principle of mutual trust, no matter how
sparingly, or under what circumstances they are utilized
7
.
Under EU Law, pursuant to Article 27 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 (the “Brussels Regulation”), in case proceedings involving the
same cause of action and between the same parties are brought in the
courts of different member states, any court other than the court first
seized, shall of its own motion stay its proceedings until such time as
the jurisdiction of the court first seized is established.
It should be noted that arbitration is listed among the exceptions to
the application of the Brussels Regulation. Within this context, the
doctrine opines that there is a right to commence parallel court pro-
ceedings alongside arbitration, which is widely criticized and seen as a
problem that can be solved by a rethinking of the Brussels Regulation
8
.
Enforcement Issues and Consequences of the Disregarding of
Anti-Suit Injunctions
The enforcement of anti-suit injunctions may be problematic. As
mentioned above, civil law jurisdictions consider these injunctions as
an intrusion of their jurisdiction. Unless the addressee of the anti-suit
injunction has assets in the issuing state that could be attached for any
breach of the court’s order, enforcement is often not possible
9
.
192
NEWSLETTER 2015
6
Case C-159/02, Gregory Paul Turner v. Felix Fareed Ismail Grovit and others [2004] ECR I-
3565.
7
Dowers
, p. 966-967.
8
Dowers
, p. 972-973.
9
Lew-Mistelis-Kröll
, p. 366.