Egypt / 02 July 2008 / Cairo Court of Appeal / Brothers for Import, Export and Supply Company (Egypt) v. Hano Acorporish (South Korea) / 23/125
| Country | Egypt |
| Court | Egypt, Cairo Court of Appeal |
| Date | 02 July 2008 |
| Parties | Brothers for Import, Export and Supply Company (Egypt) v. Hano Acorporish (South Korea) |
| Case number | 23/125 |
| Applicable NYC Provisions | V | III | V(1)(e) |
| Languages | French |
| Summary | On 10 July 2000, Brothers for Import, Export and Supply Company (“Brothers”) concluded a contract with Hano Acorporish (“Hano”) which provided in its Article 15 for the settlement of disputes arising from the contract by arbitration in Seoul, South Korea according to the Rules of the Korean Commercial Arbitration Board, as well as for the application of Korean law. On 23 December 2004, an arbitral award was issued and ordered Brother to pay damages to Hano. On 19 March 2008, Brothers filed a lawsuit before the Cairo Court of Appeal, requesting the suspension of the enforcement of the award and its setting aside on the basis of the Egyptian Arbitration Law and the NYC. The Court decided that it lacked jurisdiction to rule on the challenge made by Brothers. It noted that the application of the Egyptian Arbitration Law is limited by its Article 1 to arbitration proceedings held in Egypt and international arbitration proceedings which the Parties agreed to submit to the Egyptian Arbitration Law and that this position corresponds to Egypt’s commitment under the NYC to recognize and enforce foreign arbitral awards, as well as to the Parties’ agreement to hold arbitration proceedings outside of Egypt without submitting them to the Egyptian Arbitration Law, which means that they agreed that their dispute shall escape the jurisdiction of the Egyptian Courts. The Court deducted from Articles III and V(1)(e) NYC that only the Courts of the State where the award was issued have jurisdiction to rule on requests for its setting aside. As Egypt acceded to the NYC by Presidential Decree No. 171/1959, the provisions of the NYC are applicable even when in contradiction with the Egyptian Code of Civil and Commercial Procedure and Arbitration Law. The rule that Egyptian Courts lack jurisdiction to rule on requests for the setting aside of foreign arbitral awards is a rule relating to jurisdiction and may be applied by the Court sua sponte. Since the arbitral award challenged by Brothers was issued in Seoul and none of the Parties claimed that an agreement was ever reached with respect to the application of the Egyptian Arbitration Law, this law did not apply to the arbitral award and Egyptian Courts lacked jurisdiction to rule on the request for its setting aside. Accordingly, the Court of Appeal held that it lacked jurisdiction to rule on the challenge. |
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