Prof. Gilles Cuniberti of the Research Unit in Law has been selected by the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Justice and Consumers (DG JUST) to join an expert group on the Modernisation of Judicial Cooperation in Civil and Commercial Matters.
The Expert Group will assist the Commission in assessing further needs and gaps in the current legal framework of judicial cooperation, including the preparation of a possible initiative with regard to (but not limited to) Regulation (EC) 1393/2007 on service of documents and Regulation (EC) 1206/2001 on taking of evidence.
The EU has the task to develop the European area of justice in civil matters based on principle of mutual trust and mutual recognition of judgements. The area of justice requires judicial cooperation over the borders. For this purpose, and for the proper functioning of the internal market, the EU has adopted legislation on cross-border service of judicial and extrajudicial documents and on cooperation in taking of evidence. These are crucial instruments to regulate judicial assistance in civil and commercial matters between the member states. Their common purpose is to provide an efficient framework for cross-border judicial cooperation. They have replaced the earlier international, more cumbersome system of Hague conventions between the member states.
Although the legislation on judicial cooperation appears to address technical procedural matters, its impact on the everyday lives of EU citizens is substantial. It is applied in each and every judicial proceeding having cross-border implications; its proper functioning in these concrete cases is indispensable for ensuring access to justice and a fair trial for the parties to the proceedings (e.g. the lack of proper service of the document initiating proceedings is by far the most often used ground for refusing the recognition and enforcement of judgments). The efficiency of the framework of international judicial assistance has, therefore, a direct impact on the perception of the citizens involved in such cross-border disputes on the function of the judiciary and the state of the rule of law in the member states. This indicates both the persistent existence of problems in this area and the potential for improvements to make it easier for citizens and businesses to enforce their rights throughout the EU.
The EU Justice Agenda for 2020 specifically referred to the need to reinforce civil procedural rights, for example as regards the service of documents or the taking of evidence. The aim to improve the cooperation framework is also in close convergence with the objectives of the Commission set by the Digital Single Market Strategy. In terms of the e-Government the strategy expresses the need for more actions to modernise public (including judicial) administration, achieve cross-border interoperability and facilitate easy interaction with citizens. The initiative also fits in the agenda of the European Parliament, which has just recently adopted an own-initiative report on common minimum standards of civil procedure in the EU. The resolution, which includes recommendations to the European Commission, expresses the need of minimum procedural standards and a wider use of modern communication technology both relating to service of documents and taking of evidence.
Prof. Cuniberti is professor of comparative law and private international law at the University of Luxembourg since 2008. His research topics include international commercial law, international litigation and arbitration, comparative law and the conflict of laws. In 2017, he also participated in an Expert Group on conflict of laws regarding securities and claims.