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Banca Mediolanum
Fiscalité
Fiscalité : une réglementation nationale prévoyant d’imposer dans une mesure supérieure à 5 % de leur montant les dividendes que les intermédiaires financiers perçoivent, en tant que sociétés mères, de leurs filiales résidant dans d’autres États membres est contraire au droit de l’Union

Veracash
Libre circulation des capitaux
Services de paiement : l’utilisateur d’une carte de paiement est privé du droit d’obtenir le remboursement d’une opération de paiement non autorisée dont il a eu connaissance s’il tarde à la signaler à son prestataire de manière intentionnelle ou gravement négligente

Daka
Indépendance des juges : la double affectation des juges à la Cour suprême polonaise est compatible avec le droit de l’Union

Adrar
Espace de liberté, sécurité et justice
Avocat général Spielmann : le juge qui contrôle la légalité du placement en rétention d’un ressortissant d’un pays tiers en séjour irrégulier doit vérifier que le principe de non-refoulement ne s’oppose pas à son éloignement

Today (1 August 2025), the Arbitration Act 2025 comes into force. This is provided by the Arbitration Act 2025 (Commencement) Regulations 2025. The Act applies to arbitration proceedings commenced on or after today, as well as to court proceedings in connection with arbitration that falls within the temporal scope of the Act (section 17(4)(a)). The […]

Conventions & Instruments

On 1 July 2025:

• The 2019 Judgments Convention entered into force for the United Kingdom. At present, 33 HCCH Members are either bound by the 2019 Judgments Convention or a Contracting Party for which the Convention has not entered into force yet (Albania, Andorra, and Montenegro). More information is available here.
• The 1996 Child Protection Convention entered into force for El Salvador. The Convention currently has 57 Contracting Parties. More information is available here.
• The 2007 Child Support Convention entered into force for Colombia. At present, 55 States and the European Union are bound by the 2007 Child Support Convention. More information is available here.
• The 2005 Choice of Court Convention entered into force for Bahrain. At present, 37 States and the European Union are bound by the 2005 Choice of Court Convention. More information is available here.

On 5 July 2025, the 1970 Evidence Convention entered into force for the Philippines. The Convention currently has 69 Contracting Parties. More information is available here.

On 24 July 2025, the Republic of Moldova acceded to the 1970 Evidence Convention. The Convention currently has 69 Contracting Parties. More information is available here.

 

Publications

On 22 July 2025, the Permanent Bureau announced the publication of the fifth editions of the Practical Handbooks on the Operation of the 1965 Service and 1970 Evidence Conventions. Incorporating recent developments, court decisions, and practical examples provided by experts from around the world, as well as updates from the meeting of the Special Commission held in July 2024, the fifth editions of the Handbooks are essential resources for anyone involved in the implementation and operation of the 1965 Service and 1970 Evidence Conventions. More information is available here.

 

Meetings & Events

On 10 July 2025, the Permanent Bureau of the HCCH and the Asian Business Law Institute co-hosted the webinar “Cross-border Commercial Dispute Resolution – Electronic Service of Documents and Remote Taking of Evidence”. More information is available here.

On 11 July 2025, the first meeting of the Working Group dedicated to the Model Forms for Chapter II of the 1970 Evidence Convention was held online, hosted by the Permanent Bureau. More information is available here.

 

Other Developments

On 9 July 2025, the premises of the HCCH’s Regional Office for Africa, hosted by the Kingdom of Morocco, were officially opened in Rabat. More information is available here.

On 10 July 2025, the Permanent Bureau of the HCCH announced several developments with regard to the HCCH’s International Child Abduction Database (INCADAT), including the launch of its new notification service. More information is available here.

 

These monthly updates are published by the Permanent Bureau of the Hague Conference on Private International Law (HCCH), providing an overview of the latest developments. More information and materials are available on the HCCH website.

The Special Interest Group established in the framework of the European Law Institute (ELI) to deal with family and succession law plans to award of a prize recognizing outstanding doctoral theses in Comparative Family Law, Comparative Succession Law, and Comparative or European Private International Law in the field of family or succession. A call has […]

We are delighted to announce that Wilson Lui will be joining our Editorial Board. Wilson holds degrees from the Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, the Chinese University of Hong Kong and the University of Hong Kong. He currently teaches at the University of Hong Kong while working towards his PhD at the University of Melbourne. His many publications include a comprehensive volume on the conflict of laws in Hong Kong,  Hong Kong Private International Law (Hart 2025; together with Anselmo Reyes).

At the same time, we are sad to see Samuel Fulli-Lemaire (Université de Strasbourg), David P. Stewart (Georgetown University), and Marlene Wethmar-Lemmer (University of South Africa) retire from the blog after years of service to this project – we are all the more grateful for their contributions and wish them all the best.

The registrations for the Hague Academy Centre for Studies and Research of 2026 are open. The 2026 edition of the Centre will focus on Cyberspace and International Law. The Directors of Research will be Mohamed S. Helal (Ohio State University, Moritz College of Law) for the English-speaking section, and Lukas Rass-Masson (University of Toulouse) for […]

Written by Hadrien Pauchard (assistant researcher and doctoral student at Sciences Po Law School)

The second issue of the Revue Critique de droit international privé of 2025 has just been released. It contains four articles, seven case notes and numerous book reviews. In line with the Revue Critique’s recent policy, the doctrinal part will soon be made available in English on the editor’s website (for registered users and institutions).

The issue opens with Dr. Delphine Porcheron’s (Université de Strasbourg) in-depth study of Les actions transnationales en réparation de crimes internationaux commis par un État : l’émergence d’un nouveau contentieux (Transnational reparation claims for international crimes committed by States: the emergence of a new form of litigation). At the crossroads of public and private international law, the contribution discusses the lessons learned from emblematic cases rendered across multiple jurisdictions. Its abstract reads as follows:

In light of the limited availability of international judicial remedies for individuals and the inadequacy of existing compensation schemes, victims of international crimes attributable to a State increasingly seek redress through domestic courts. These transnational claims for reparation are on the rise and have generated a new category of litigation, raising complex legal questions. An emerging trend in favor of the admissibility of such actions before national courts calls for a re-examination of the relationship between different branches of law and highlights the evolving role of private international law in this context.

The second article by Prof. Rebecca Legendre (Université Paris Nanterre) untangles recent controversies on Le droit international privé à l’épreuve de la gestation pour autrui (Private international law facing surrogacy). The treatment of foreign surrogacy in prohibitive legal orders such as France raises serious legal debates, recently fuelled by several important rulings by the French Supreme Court which the present contribution analyses:

For over fifteen years, surrogacy has posed a persistent challenge to private international law. The most recent case law from France’s Cour de Cassation underscores this tension with striking clarity. The decisions handed down in October and November 2024 introduce significant developments to the field: the weakening of a substantive international public policy which is stripped of its essence, a procedural public policy distorted in service of substantive aims, a softening of the principle prohibiting review of the merits of foreign judgments, and the neutralisation of sanctions for fraud. Yet, upon closer examination, private international law appears ill-equipped to provide satisfactory solutions. It is by moving beyond its traditional boundaries—drawing instead on the framework of fundamental rights, and particularly on the principle of proportionality—that more viable and equitable answers may be found in the future.

In the third contribution, Dr. Georgette Salamé (Université Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne) and Dr. Guillaume Kessler (Université Savoie Mont Blanc) share thoughtful Réflexions sur l’accueil du sexe neutre en droit international privé (A propos de la décision du Tribunal fédéral suisse du 8 juin 2023) (Reflections on the Legal Recognition of a Third Sex Category in Private International Law (in light of the Swiss Supreme Federal Court’s decision of June 8, 2023)). Its abstract reads as follows:

The decision issued by the Swiss Supreme Federal Court on June 8, 2023, relates to the recognition of gender neutrality in binary legal systems. The Court ruled that a Swiss female citizen that had exercised in Germany the option to leave her gender designation blank in public registers, may not avail herself of such status to claim the same in Switzerland. The decision is remarkable considering the recent developments of private international law and therefore requires thorough assessment of its legal grounds. Moreover, it prompts a prospective study of the possible recognition in France of intersex individuals’ claims to a neutral gender registration in instances where such claims are based on a foreign judgment or foreign public document. It finally calls for an examination of considerations that argue for or against the recognition of a neutral gender in France from the standpoint of private international law; the analysis addresses the ongoing evolution of international public policy and the degree to which the legal categories of the forum can be reinterpreted and adapted.

The doctrinal part of the issue wraps up with Prof. Maxime Barba’s (Université Grenobles Alpes) essay on Les impératifs de concentration en matière d’exequatur des jugements (Concentration imperatives in matters of judgements’ exequatur). Tackling a major procedural issue that is playing an increasingly important role in transnational disputes, the contribution’s abstract reads as follows:

In a world where judgements circulate more and more freely, the exact place of concentration imperatives needs to be determined. Can a party initiate a new indirect proceeding by changing its pleas? Can a party assert, in the requested forum, pleas and claims omitted in the original forum? These are just some of the questions now facing French and European judges, who are taking their time, hesitating and, sometimes, contradicting each other. The aim of this contribution is to present the various solutions currently in force, and to suggest ways in which they might be developed – modified or generalized –, with a view to enabling jurisprudence to step up and improve its normative approach to these delicate issues.

The full table of contents will be available here.

Previous issues of the Revue Critique (from 2010 to 2022) are available on Cairn.

Written by Héloise Meur, Université Paris 8

In two rulings dated 28 May 2025, the French Cour de cassation (Supreme Court) ruled on the issue of the law applicable to a sub-purchaser’s direct action in a chain of contracts transferring ownership, under European private international law. The issue is sensitive. The contractual classification under French law —an outlier in comparative law— had not been upheld by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) to determine international jurisdiction under the Brussels system (CJEU, 17 June 1992, C-26/91, Jakob Handte). Despite CJEU’s position, the Cour de cassation had consistently refused to adopt a tort-based qualification to determine the applicable law (esp. Civ. 1st, 18 dec. 1990, n° 89-12.177 ; 10 oct. 1995, n° 93-17.359 ; 6 feb. 1996, n° 94-11.143 ; Civ. 3rd, 16 janv. 2019, n° 11-13.509. See also, Civ. 1st, 16 jan. 2019, n° 17-21.477), until these two rulings rendered under the Rome II Regulation.

The proceedings

In the first case (No. 23-13.687), a Luxembourgian company made available to a Belgian company certain equipment it had obtained through two lease contracts. The lessor had acquired the equipment from a French intermediate seller, who had purchased it from a French distributor, who had sourced it from a Belgian manufacturer (whose rights were ultimately transferred to a Czech company).

Following a fire that destroyed the equipment, the Dutch insurer — subrogated in the rights of the Luxembourgian policyholder — brought proceedings against the French companies before the French courts on the basis of latent defects. The manufacturer’s general terms and conditions included a choice-of-law clause in favour of Belgian law. The Belgian and Luxembourg companies sought various sums based on latent defects, lack of conformity, and breach of the selller’s duty to advise. The manufacturer voluntarily joined the proceedings.

Applying French law, the Court of Appeal held the insurer’s subrogated claims admissible and dismissed the French intermediary seller’s claims. The Court ordered the Czech manufacturer and French companies jointly and severally liable to compensate the Luxembourg company for its uninsured losses and to reimburse the French intermediary seller for the insured equipment. The manufacturer appealed to the Cour de cassation, and the French distributor lodged a cross appeal.

In the second case (No. 23-20.341), a French company was in charge of designing and building a photovoltaic power plant in Portugal. The French company purchased the solar panels from a German company. The sales contract included a jurisdiction clause in favour of the courts of Leipzig and a choice-of-law clause in favour of German law. In 2018, the Portuguese company, as assignee of the original contract, brought proceedings against the French and German companies seeking avoidance of the successive sales and restitution of the purchase price. Alternatively, the Portuguese final purchaser invoked the contractual warranty granted by the German manufacturer and sought damages. The Court of Appeal dismissed the purchaser’s claim under German law, which was applicable to the original contract. The Court of Appeal also declined jurisdiction over the French company’s claims against the German company due to the jurisdiction clause. The purchaser appealed to the Cour de cassation.

The legal question

Both appeals raised the question of the determination of the law applicable to the sub-purchaser’s direct action in a chain of contracts transferring ownership under European private international law, especially where a choice-of-law clause is included in the original contract.

The rulings of 28 May 2025

The Cour de cassation adopted the reasoning of the Jacob Handte judgment. The Court held that, in conflict of laws, the sub-purchaser’s action against the manufacturer does not qualify as a “contractual matter” but must be classified as “non-contractual” and therefore be governed by the Rome II Regulation (§§ 16 seq n° 23-13.687 ; §§ 18 seq n° 23-20.341).

The Court concluded that: “A choice-of-law clause stipulated in the original contract between the manufacturer and the first purchaser, to which the sub-purchaser is not a party and to which they have not consented, does not constitute a choice of law applicable to the non-contractual obligation within the meaning of Article 14(1) of that Regulation.” (§ 20, n° 23-13.687 ; § 22, n° 23-20.341).

This solution should be also supported by the Refcomp ruling (§ 18, n° 23-13.687 ; § 16, n° 23-20.341), in which the Court held that a jurisdiction clause is not enforceable against the sub-purchaser, “insofar as the sub-purchaser and the manufacturer must be regarded, for the purposes of the Brussels I Regulation, as not being bound by a contractual relationship” (CJEU, 7 Feb. 2013, C-543/10, para. 33).

According to the Cour de cassation, the law applicable to sub-purchaser’s claims against the manufacturer is the law of the place where the damage occurred, pursuant to Article 4 of the Rome II Regulation.

Comments

Firstly, the rejection of the contractual classification does not necessarily entail a tortious classification. To do so, it must also be established that the action seeks the liability of the defendant, in accordance with the definition adopted in the Kalfelis judgment (ECJ, 27 Sept. 1988, Case 189/87). It was not the case here, where the claims were based on latent defects and avoidance of contract.

Secondly, the choice of a non-contractual classification appears contrary to the developments in CJEU’s recent case law (H. Meur, Les accords de distribution en droit international privé, Bruylant, 2024, pp. 325 seq.), For the CJEU, it is sufficient to establish that the action could not exist in the absence of a contractual link for it to qualify as a “contractual claim” under Brussels I Regulation (CJEU, 20 Apr. 2016, C-366/13, para. 55, Profit Investment). The European Court further held that the identity of the parties is irrelevant to determine whether the action falls within the scope of contractual matters ; only the cause of the action matters (CJEU, 7 Mar. 2018, Flightright, joined cases C-274/16, C-447/16, C-448/16; and CJEU, 4 Oct. 2018, Feniks, C-337/17). Thus, the Court has moved away from its Jacob Handte case law.

Thirdly, limiting the effect of the choice-of-law clause to the contracting parties alone is inappropriate, as it will lead to the applicable law to the contract to vary depending on who invokes it (H. Meur, Dalloz actualité, 16 June 2025). This solution is also contrary to the European regulations. It is in contradiction with Article 3.1 of the Rome I Regulation, which states that “a contract shall be governed by the law chosen by the parties.” It is also incompatible with Article 3.2 of the Regulation. This article provides that “any change in the law to be applied that is made after the conclusion of the contract shall not […] adversely affect the rights of third parties,” from which it must be inferred a contrario that the original choice-of-law clause is enforceable against third parties (see the report by Reporting Judge S. Corneloup, pp. 21 seq.; also see the Report on the Convention on the Law Applicable to Contractual Obligations, OJEC, C 282, 31 Oct. 1980, para. 7 under the commentary on Article 3). For the sake of consistency, this understanding of the principle of party autonomy should also apply to Article 14 of the Rome II Regulation. Finally, Article 12 of the Rome I Regulation confirms that it is for the law applicable to the contract to determine the persons entitled to invoke it and the conditions under which they may do so (by contrast, the Vienna Convention on the International Sale of Goods and the Hague Convention do not apply to the question of the effect of the contract on third parties – see in particular Hague Convention, 1955, Art. 5.4; Civ. 1st, 12 July 2023, No. 21-22.843).

Thus, the law applicable to the sub-purchaser’s direct action should be the one chosen by the parties to the original contract (regardless of the claiming party), provided that this choice is intended to govern the contract. In the absence of a chosen law, the law of the habitual residence of the seller, as the debtor of the characteristic performance, should apply. If the designated law recognises, in principle, that a third party may invoke the rights available to the original contracting purchaser, the Vienna and Hague Conventions, which are applicable before the French courts, may regain their relevance in determining the content of those rights (see V. Heuzé, RCDIP, 2019, p. 534; E. Farnoux, AJ Contrat, 2020, p. 521).

Unfortunately, this is not the path taken by the Cour de cassation in its rulings of 28 May 2025. In practice, the original seller may be bound in respect of certain sub-purchasers, particularly those established in France, even though it may have had no knowledge of the successive sales. Such a solution increases legal uncertainty.

In 2022, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) held in its KK and Others v. Denmark judgment that Denmark had violated Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) by its legislative measures trying to prevent commercial surrogacy arrangements (reported for the blog here). Measures were taken by Danish institutions in response […]

The third issue of the Journal du droit international for 2025 has been released. It contains one article and several case notes relating to private international law issues. It is also worth mentioning a contribution on (public) international law that echoes a special issue of the Journal, published earlier this year to mark its 150th anniversary. In […]

Any student of German private international law will take delight in the news that a new textbook has just been published by our co-editor Susanne Goessl together with Florian Kienle. The book covers questions of both the applicable law (internationales Privatrecht) and of jurisdiction and foreign judgments (internationales Zivilverfahrensrecht), with a certain focus on the former area. As one might expect from a new text, it puts the European instruments of private international law (and the areas governed by them) into the centre (pp. 16–144) – without neglecting the areas that remain governed by domestic law (pp. 145–282).

Readers looking to familiarize themselves with German PIL will appreciate the concise introduction to the field (pp. 1–15), the comprehensive coverage of fundamental questions (such as renvoi, characterisation, etc.; starting at p. 157), and the revision questions provided at the end of each chapter. Above all else, however, they will notice the many topical examples used by the authors to explain the material, ranging from climate change and human rights litigation to Covid, the Volkswagen emissions scandal, and the 2021 Suez Canal obstruction by the Ever Given. The wealth of these examples alone makes the book a great read even for those who may consider themselves already well acquainted with German PIL (not least if they need to teach it).

More information on the book is available here.

 

Nadia Rusinova has recently published an open access book titled Practical Handbook on EU Family Law. Part I: Key Concepts, Legal Terminology, and CJEU Case Law in Cross-Border Judicial Cooperation (2025).The Handbook can be downloaded from the Author’s website here. The blurb reads as follows: The EU Family Law Handbook is a unique, practitioner-focused resource, […]

The author of this post is Pierfancesco Rossi, tenured researcher of International Law at the University of Teramo. On 5 June 2025, the Hague Court of Appeal declined to grant exequatur to a Ukrainian judgment holding Russian energy giant Gazprom jointly and severally liable for material damages incurred during Russia’s invasion of the country. The […]

UBS Group e.a. / Commission
Concurrence
Concurrence : le Tribunal confirme la participation de Credit Suisse à une entente dans le secteur des opérations de change au comptant mais réduit de 83,2 à 28,9 millions d’euros le montant de l’amende qui lui est imposée

At the University of Vienna, a Chair for Comparative Law and Private International Law will become vacant in 2026 (current holder: Professor Helmut Ofner). We are looking for experts around the world.   The role will primarily involve teaching and research in private international law and comparative law. Knowledge of the German language and the […]

Originally sourced from Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law post on 22 July 2025, with slight amedments.

Make today matter! Under this motto, legal scholars from all over the world gathered at the University of Pretoria on July 8, 2025 to take part in the conference “Sustainable Development and Transnational Law in Africa”. The event was jointly organized by the Law Schools Global League and Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law with a view to fostering academic exchange across continents on today’s most pressing challenges.

“It was fantastic to see the breadth and depth of work done in and on Africa within the new field of sustainable development and private international law. Thanks are due also to our co-organizers at the Law Schools Global League ant the University of Pretoria; it is so important to hold conferences like this one outside of Europe,” says Max Planck Institute’s Director Ralf Michaels.

The conference program consisted of four panel discussions (for a report, see ? here). The last two panels brought together five of the participants in a current project titled “Private International Law and Sustainable Development in Africa”**:

Solomon Okorley (University of Johannesburg) spoke about International Child Abduction Jurisprudence in South Africa; Grihobou Roland Nombré (Thomas SANKARA University School of Law) discussed the implications of the rise of Nuclear Energy in Africa for Private International Law; Michael K. Quartey (University of Johannesburg) and Theophilus Edwin Coleman (University at Buffalo School of Law & University of Johannesburg) addressed Product Liability Disputes in Ghana from the perspective of sustainable development, and Panji Chirwa (University of Pretoria) looked at the Impact of the EU Directive 2024/1760 on African Sustainability Frameworks.

** The project “Private International Law and Sustainable Development in Africa” forms the African component of the broader initiative “The Private Side of Transforming our World – UN Sustainable Development Goals 2030 and the Role of Private International Law” (see ? here), led globally by Ralf Michaels (Max Planck Institute),  Hans Van Loon (previously Secretary General of the Hague Conference on Private International), and Veronica Ruiz Abou-Nigm (University of Edinburgh). The African initiative is spearheaded by Chukwuma Samuel Adesina Okoli (University of Birmingham), in partnership with Eghosa Ekhator (University of Derby) and the Journal of Sustainable Development Law and Policy (Afe Babalola University, Nigeria), and works closely with the global project leaders.

Publication of the fifth editions of the Practical Handbooks on the Operation of the 1965 Service and 1970 Evidence Conventions

The Permanent Bureau of the HCCH is pleased to announce that the fifth editions of the Practical Handbooks on the Operation of the 1965 Service and 1970 Evidence Conventions are now available for purchase in both paper and e-book format.

The 1965 Service and 1970 Evidence Conventions establish uniform frameworks of cooperation mechanisms to streamline, respectively, the transmission of documents for service abroad and the taking of evidence abroad. The Service and Evidence Handbooks are intended to assist users of the Conventions, including Central Authorities, government officials, courts, counsel and legal practitioners, by providing practical guidance on their implementation and operation.

The Practical Handbook on the 1965 Service Convention is designed first and foremost to assist users with the operation of the main and alternative channels of transmission and the provisions regarding adequate protection of the defendant. As for the Practical Handbook on the 1970 Evidence Convention, it is designed to assist users with the operation of the two systems of taking evidence that are provided by the Convention, namely (1) Letters of Request and (2) Consuls and Commissioners. The Practical Handbooks also explain how information technology is and may be used to further enhance the operation of the Conventions, including by incorporating, for the 1970 Evidence Convention, relevant information from the HCCH Guide to Good Practice on the Use of Video-Link.

Incorporating recent developments, court decisions, and practical examples provided by experts from around the world, as well as updates from the meeting of the Special Commission held in July 2024, the fifth editions of the Handbooks are essential resources for anyone involved in the implementation and operation of the 1965 Service and 1970 Evidence Conventions.

More information on how to purchase hard copies and/or e-book copies is available on the Publications section of the HCCH website (for the general public).  Specific instructions for HCCH National and Contact Organs and Member Central Authorities designated under the Service and Evidence Conventions are also provided on the Publications section of the HCCH website.

This post is published by the Permanent Bureau of the Hague Conference of Private International Law (HCCH).