The subject of the considerations are drafts of: the EU regulation on jurisdiction, applicable law, recognition and enforcement of measures and cooperation in matters relating to the protection of adults, as well as the decision to authorize EU Member States to accede to the 2000 Hague Convention on the protection of adults concerning cross-border personal and care matters. The documents dated May 31, 2023 refer not only to the legal status of a person (e.g. partial incapacitation, guardianship, assistance in performing legal actions or functionally similar institutions under foreign law), but also the effects on civil law contracts with third parties (including rights and obligations within legal transactions). Detailed comments are presented about “measures of protection” for adults in legal transactions with foreign countries. The 2000 Hague Convention
raises reflections on current trends in the sources of international civil procedure and private international law. They include, among others, the planned co-existence of the Hague convention and the EU “Brussels” and “Rome” regulations. The attempt to increase the number of parties to the convention and the participation of EU Member States generally deserve a positive assessment, which also means the ratification of the 2000 Hague Convention by Poland. However, some doubts are cast by the intention for simultaneous modification through an EU regulation. The idea of a draft EU regulation of 2023, intended to supplement and modify an international agreement for the needs of a regional economic integration organization, could prima facie be assessed positively. However, a detailed look at the draft regulation of 2023 leads to the conclusion that it should be corrected, as it partly contains provisions that are both desirable for judicial cooperation between Member States and solutions that are unnecessary or questionable. In particular, the proposed solution allowing for an unlimited choice of jurisdiction may raise doubts. It is not intended — as is typically the case in personal civil matters — that a jurisdiction can be chosen from among states that are in some way related to the adult’s current or future situation (e.g. by citizenship, location of assets, past or future residence, circumstances relating to the guardian or curator). Thus, a country (and law) may be chosen that are completely unrelated to the actual situation. Additionally, the proposed Articles 6—7 are not compatible with the conventional catalog of circumstances that determine the transfer of jurisdiction, nor with the conflict of law rules (Article 15), which provide for the choice of the applicable law in a narrower range of situations (citizenship, previous habitual residence, location of property). Under the proposed EU regulation the indirect possibility of choice of foreign law is possible through the choice of foreign jurisdiction. This makes it possible to achieve a substantive legal effect by the adult “selecting” the substantive law that he or she deems desirable at the time of choice, thus completely departing from the remaining provisions of the Convention and the Regulation in terms of jurisdiction and applicable law. There
is no limitation to such an indirect choice from the perspective of the interests of third parties with whom the adult has personal or property relations. Moreover, such a solution may mean, in practice, a departure from the basic substantive legal principles of the country in which a given adult lives (habitually resides) or is a citizen, in favor of accepting the consequences resulting from a distant fact (i.e. unrelated to the actual situation) and legally (i.e. providing for axiologically different solutions concerning the broad category of ‘measures of protection’) of given law and state. Taking into account the variants of legislative action described in the impact assessment report (document 10108/23ADD), it would be worth postulating a change to the proposed method of legislative action. It seems more rational to temporally distinguish the
two planned activities (projects) under option 4. First, take steps to join the 2000 Hague Convention and gather several years of experience in its operation, also between Member States. And then, in the longer term, taking into account the experience of applying the convention on the territory of the EU, consider supplementing or modifying intra-EU judicial cooperation in these matters. The longer experience of applying the 2000 Hague Convention can — firstly — verify the thesis about the need to improve its functioning, and secondly — determine precisely in which areas it would be desirable for the welfare
of adults and their guardians in cross-border cases.

The Agreement of May 24, 1993 between the Republic of Poland and Ukraine on legal assistance and legal relations in civil and criminal matters, apart from Article 34(1), does not contain conflict of laws rules relevant to property law relations and possession of movable property. Then again, due to the ease of transporting  movables between countries, the universality and much lower extent of formalization of the trade in them, difficulties in determining their owner or persons entitled under other property rights, susceptibility to actual dispositions not based on the will of the owner, and on the other hand, far-reaching differences in the way their legal regime is regulated in the substantive law of various countries, many practical problems arise. The solution to these problems requires first that the applicable law is determined. The probability of the occurrence of this type of issues in Polish-Ukrainian relations has recently intensified because of mass migration of people from Ukraine to Poland, which is accompanied by the transfer of movable items across the state border on an unprecedented scale. Given the lack of appropriate regulations in the provisions of the 1993 legal assistance agreement, Polish and Ukrainian courts must apply domestic conflict of laws rules relevant to proprietary matters. Differences between these rules may result in the application of substantive norms belonging to different legal systems, which poses the risk of forum shopping.
The article analyses the methods of determining the law applicable to property law relations and possession of movable property in Polish-Ukrainian relations against the backdrop of Polish and Ukrainian conflict of laws rules, the similarities and differences between them, the problems emerging from the differences in the substantive property law of both countries, and the means of overcoming them. It also includes a proposal to supplement the legal assistance agreement of 1993 with uniform conflict of laws rules for determining the law applicable to proprietary rights in movable property, modeled on selected solutions taken from Polish and Ukrainian national laws.

The article is focused on issues related to the concept of legal capacity and capacity for legal actions in Polish-Ukrainian relations. The article presents a legal analysis of the doctrine, jurisprudence, domestic law and provisions of the 1993 Polish-Ukrainian Convention concerning legal capacity and capacity for legal actions. The author focuses on showing the differences between the two legal systems and proposes an autonomous interpretation of the above-mentioned concepts on the basis of the 1993 Convention binding Poland and Ukraine. Separate attention has been paid to the linguistic differences occurring in the translation of the concept of the capacity for legal actions in the 1993 Convention and the concept of capacity for legal actions in family and labour relations. While in the case of legal capacity no fundamental differences have been noted, the concept of the capacity for legal actions already contains such differences, given the broad understanding of this concept in Ukrainian law. The purpose of this paper was to prepare practical guidance for legal practitioners who will be assessing the legal effects of actions performed by Polish and Ukrainian citizens.

The increasing phenomenon of remote working raises challenges for employers, national legislators, as well as for private international law. The complete transfer of the employment relationship to the remote plane moves the centres of activity of the employer and the employee away from each other, which can be seen especially in employment relationships with a foreign element (e.g. employment of a permanent employee living in another country). The question then arises — momentous from the point of view of the conflict of laws rules — as to the law applicable to this employment relationship. The answer must be made in the light of the EU provisions on the law applicable to the individual employment contract (Article 8 of the Rome I Regulation) and the posting of workers (Directive 96/71/EC). Their juxtaposition may result in the need for the employer to take into account the competing legal regimes. Indeed, under Article 8(2) of the Rome I Regulation, the law applicable to an individual employment contract is the law of the country in which the employee habitually carries out his work in performance of the contract. Determining this state may, in an increasingly digital age, give rise to numerous difficulties, not least despite the considerable body of case law of the CJEU. Similar doubts may arise when assessing whether the conditions for posting set out in Directive 96/71/EC are fulfilled. An analysis of the statements of representatives of the doctrine, especially foreign
doctrine, and of the jurisprudence has made it possible to establish that the current conflict-of-law rules are not in line with the modern needs of circulation. There is also a discrepancy between the norms of international labour law and social security regulations. This leads to the conclusion that the intervention of the legislator is necessary in order to balance the conflicting expectations of employers and employees. In this context, the article is both cognitive (it contains an analysis of the existing regulations) and theoretical. The analyses and conclusions presented may also prove useful for the practice of law.

The article discusses the judgment of Stockholm Chamber of Commerce in the case SCC, Case no. V007/2008 Italia Ukraina Gas S.P.A v. National Joint-Stock Company “Naftogaz of Ukraine.” The case was that the two companies, IUGAS and Naftogaz, had entered into a gas supply agreement, where Naftogaz undertook to supply up to 13 milliard cubic metres over 10 years. However, the contract was never fulfilled. As a result, IUGAS brought an action against Naftogaz claiming Naftogaz’s obligation to deliver gas and any liability in the form of penalties and damages arising from Naftogaz’s failure to deliver gas. The parties also requested bifurcation of the proceedings. The subject of this gloss is the separate judgment of 19 October 2010. In this article, the author has analysed the current case law on CISG and the view of the doctrine. The following conclusions were drawn: 1. Gas is a commodity within the meaning of the CISG. 2. A party must meet a total of six conditions for the possibility of exemption from liability for damages, but Naftogaz has not met the condition of overcoming the obstacle. 3. The CISG provides mechanisms for exempting a party from liability for non-performance of a contract, but Naftogaz did not meet the conditions for exemption from liability. 4. Contractual penalties fall within the scope of the indemnity liability regime of Article 74 of the CISG. The purpose of this article is to examine the validity of the conclusions and decisions taken by the Stockholm Chamber of Commerce.

Unfortunately, Ukrainian children and their parents are faced with a lot of serious challenges to their rights and the situation as a result of Russian-Ukrainian war. Taking into account these challenges, the author focuses on the rules of two Hague Children’s Conventions: Convention of 25 October 1980 on the Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction and Convention of 19 October 1996 on Jurisdiction, Applicable Law, Recognition, Enforcement and Co-operation in Respect of Parental Responsibility and Measures for the Protection of Children. One of the aims of the article is to compare court decisions, delivered in child abduction cases by Ukrainian courts and courts of the foreign states after February 24, 2022, in order to answer the question about the influence of issues of the security situation in Ukraine on the application of Article 13 (1) (b) of the 1980 Hague Convention. Attention is also paid to Article 21 of the 1980 Hague Convention and the institution of provisional measures of the 1996 Hague Convention that can be imposed in international child abduction cases, as alternative ways of (judicial) protection of the rights of parents-citizens of Ukraine who remained in Ukraine and lost contact with their children as a result of their removal abroad. The article also deals with specific issues of jurisdiction of the cases on determining the place of residence under the 1996 Hague Convention and peculiarities of the proceedings on establishing the fact of birth of a child on the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, over which Ukraine does not exercise effective control nowadays, particularly applying the rules of the Code of Civil Procedure of Ukraine and the Namibia exception. All of the abovementioned issues are analyzed, among others, on the basis of the Supreme Court Resolutions.