News

Partner Thomas Rouhette, Senior Associate Ela Barda and Trainee Inès Aramouni examine the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments within the EU.

This article was originally published in ICLG – Enforcement of Foreign Judgments, on 30 March 2022.

An extract of Signature’s contribution may be found below and the full article can be found here. 

European Union: Enforcement of Foreign Judgments Laws and Regulations

1. Introduction

The recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments within the EU is subject to different regimes depending on whether the judgment originates from an EU Member State, a European Free Trade Association (“EFTA”) State or a third country.

This chapter will focus on the first two cases and will provide with an overview of the European recognition and enforcement instruments (2).  This chapter will therefore not cover the recognition and enforcement of judgments given by a third country, which are subject, where applicable, to bilateral agreements that may exist between the said third country and the Member State addressed, to international conventions such as the 2005 Hague Convention on choice of court agreements, or to the local rules of the Member State addressed applicable to the recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments.

The EU has drawn up numerous instruments on enforcement in several areas: instruments of general application to all judgments in civil and commercial matters, but also instruments in specific areas such as family law (e.g., parental responsibility or matrimonial matters) or insolvency proceedings.  This chapter will focus on the description of the EU instruments applicable to judgments in civil and commercial matters (3).

The analysis will focus on the mechanisms for enforcement of decisions issued by judicial authorities and will therefore not cover recognition and enforcement of arbitral awards which are governed by the 1958 New York Convention, to which all Member States of the EU are signatories.

Finally, the last section will deal with European instruments aimed at facilitating and accelerating the effective enforcement of judgments and the recovery of claims (4).

Impact of Brexit on the UK regime

After signing the Brexit deal on 30 December 2020, the UK is no longer bound by EU law.  European regulations and conventions applicable to the recognition and enforcement of judgments are no longer enforceable in the UK.  As such, the UK is no longer bound by either the Brussels I recast Regulation or the Lugano Convention.  The UK has applied to accede to the Lugano Convention, but such accession requires the unanimous approval of all signatories.  The UK’s application is still pending as the European Commission has so far refused to grant its consent, and recommended that Member States reject the UK’s application.