Abstract

This commentary examines the judgement of the CJEU of 18 October 2016 in case C-135/15 Republik Griechenland v. Grigorios Nikiforidis. The judgement in question concerns the issue of treatment of foreign overriding mandatory provisions under the Article 9(3) of Regulation No 593/2008. This topic is the subject to a great deal of controversy and academic discussion. The ECJ concluded that the mentioned provision must be interpreted as precluding overriding mandatory provisions other than those of the State of the forum or of the State where the obligations arising out of the contract have to be or have been performed from being applied, as legal rules, by the court of the forum, but as not precluding it from taking such other overriding mandatory provisions into account as matters of fact in so far as this is provided for by the national law that is applicable to the contract pursuant to the Regulation. This interpretation is not affected by the principle of sincere cooperation laid down in Article 4(3) TEU. In this respect the judgement of CJEU brings significant clarification on the question, whether a court of the forum can have regard to foreign overriding mandatory provisions, which do not belong to the legal system of the country of performance of the contract on the level of the applicable substantive law. However, there are still questions arising under Article 9(3) of Rome I Regulation, which need to be clarified.