How, if at all, will Deutsche Bank affect the restrictions on the use of anti-suit injunctions? Janna Purdie reports
In February the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruled that anti-suit injunctions restraining another party from commencing or continuing proceedings before the court in another member state were incompatible with the Judgments Regulation (see Allianz SpA v West Tankers [2009] All ER (D) 82 (Feb)).
Three months later the Commercial Court in Shashoua v Sharma [2009] All ER (D) 64 (May) refused to extend the ambit of that principle beyond the EU leaving anti-suit injunctions to fight another day.The outcome of these applications meant that the parties were subject to concurrent proceedings in the English and Texas courts. Highland sought to appeal the anti-suit injunction decision. The Court of Appeal considered two issues: the effect of a non-exclusive jurisdiction clause; whether an anti-suit injunction should have been granted.
Non-exclusive jurisdiction clause
The first instance decision found that where there were parallel proceedings, the proceedings commenced in a different jurisdiction to that provided for in the non-exclusive jurisdiction clause would be regarded as vexatious
