Bich

Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Judgment in Civil and Commercial Matters; A Proposal for Vietnam

After 20 years of applying an Open Door policy, Vietnam is becoming more and more involved in international trade and investment. To promote international trade en investment, Vietnam needs to gain the confidence of foreign investors and traders to invest in Vietnam or to trade with Vietnamese Partners. It needs to provide legal predictability and legal certainty for, among other things, the important field of recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments. Indeed for businesspersons what they are concerned with is to protect themselves from their recalcitrant counterparts who would either evade paying the debts which are stated in judgments or try to re-litigate already decided disputes. In other words, they desire predictability and security for their international transactions. The current law of Vietnam only recognises and enforces judgments of a foreign country when Vietnam has signed a treaty with that country as to judgment enforcement; of if no treaty applies, when the principle of reciprocity applies to that country. The fact that so far Vietnam has signed a few bilateral legal assistance agreements on this matter does not begin to catch up with the incredible increases in the numbers of foreign trading partners. The reciprocity principle was added to the Civil Procedure Code in 2004 with the expectation that this principle will fill a gap in the repealed Ordinance on Recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments 1993 with regard to judgments of non-treaty countries. This more of less reflected the perception of the lawmakers of a need to provide a predictable and certain legal basis for promoting confidence of business persons in Vietnam. The goal of this study is to find out whether the current law really meets what the lawmakers intended concerning both the reciprocity principle and the current conditions for recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments, or whether there should be changes. In order to do that, this book examines the law and regulation on recognition and enforcement of foreign judgments of Vietnam and some selected countries that represent both civil law and common law traditions. In addition, some worldwide instruments are also researched. From the results of that examination, the research then grows into a comparative study that points out the answers to the questions that are set op for the law of Vietnam. Table of Contents: Acknowledgments Table of Contents Abbreviations Introduction Chapter 1: Vietnamese Law on Foreign Judgment Recognition and Enforcement Chapter 2: Dutch Law on Foreign Judgment Recognition and Enforcement Chapter 3: Australian Law on Foreign Judgment Recognition and Enforcement Chapter 4: The Hague Project on Jurisdiction and Foreign Judgments in Civil and Commercial Matters Chapter 5: Comparisons and Conclusions Text of Proposal Annex I - Accepted Grounds of Jurisdiction Annex II - Australian Foreign Judgments Regulation 1992 Summary Samenvatting Bibliography