پژوهش های حقوق تطبیقی (Dec 2022)
The Enforcement of Anti-Suit Injunctions: A Comparative Study in the EU, French, and Iranian Law
Abstract
One way of dealing with parallel litigation for the courts of common law countries is to issue an anti-suit injunction preventing one of the disputing parties from initiating or continuing proceedings in the courts of another country. Civil law countries believe that this remedy interferes with the proceedings in their courts and violates their national sovereignty. This study aims to examine the attitude of the EU, French, and Iranian law towards the enforcement of anti-suit injunctions. The study contends that in the EU, an anti-suit injunction rendered by a third country is enforceable in an EU member state as long as it accepts the enforcement of such an injunction under its national law and its jurisdiction is not based on EU regulations. In French law, anti-suit injunctions are traditionally unenforceable. However, when parties agree to grant jurisdiction to a foreign court, the French courts enforce such injunctions and dismiss the proceedings in favor of the foreign-selected court. On the other hand, when the French courts assert exclusive jurisdiction to decide the dispute, they may react to an anti-suit injunction by issuing an anti-anti-suit injunction. In Iranian law, an anti-suit injunction cannot be enforced under Article 169 of the Enforcement of Civil Judgments Code. As a result, there is no mechanism for the enforcement of anti-suit injunctions in Iran. However, due to the advantages of enforcing anti-suit injunctions, the study contends that the lack of a mechanism should not be an obstacle to the enforcement of anti-suit injunctions in Iran.
