January 2023
Lihui Jiang and Teresa Huang
On November 14, 2022, the Supreme People’s Court promulgated the Provisions of the Supreme People’s Court on Several Issues Concerning the Jurisdiction over Foreign-Related Civil and Commercial Cases (hereinafter referred to as the “Provisions”), which shall come into effect on January 1, 2023. There are several modifications compared with the Provisions of the Supreme People’s Court on Several Issues Concerning the Litigation Jurisdiction over Foreign-Related Civil and Commercial Cases (hereinafter referred to as the “Original Provisions”), mainly including the following aspects:
1. Clarifying the jurisdictional principles for the first instance of foreign-related civil and commercial cases
The Original Provisions were enacted in 2002, which better solved the constraint of insufficient adjudicatory capacity for foreign-related cases at the time of China’s accession to the WTO, but has contents conflicted with the Civil Procedure Law. Article 1 of the Provisions, based on Articles 18 and 19 of the Civil Procedure Law, clarifies that the first instance of foreign-related civil and commercial cases shall, in principle, be under the jurisdiction of the basic people’s courts.
2. Specifying the circumstances under which the first instance of foreign-related civil and commercial cases are not under the jurisdiction of the basic people’s courts
The Provisions clarify that the first instance of foreign-related civil and commercial cases involving a large amount of subject matter in dispute, complex circumstances or multiple litigants, or other cases which have major influence in their respective jurisdiction shall be under the jurisdiction of the intermediate people’s courts. Further, the first instance of foreign-related civil and commercial cases under jurisdiction of the High People’s Courts are cases where the subject matter of litigation is RMB 5 billion or above or other cases with major impact in their respective jurisdiction.
3. Innovative adjustment on the jurisdictional thresholds of courts at different levels
In view of the differences in the level of economic development in various regions of China, the Provisions set jurisdictional standards for the first instance of foreign-related civil and commercial cases under the jurisdiction of the intermediate people’s courts according to different regions, specifying that the Intermediate People’s Courts of Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Chongqing, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, Shandong and Guangdong have jurisdiction over foreign-related civil and commercial cases with a litigation subject matter of RMB 40 million or above, while the Intermediate People’s Courts of other regions have jurisdiction over those cases with a litigation subject matter of RMB 20 million or above.
4. Specifying the cases in which the Provisions are not applicable
For some highly specialized and complex cases, Article 6 of the Provisions clarifies that the Provisions are not applicable to foreign-related maritime disputes, foreign-related intellectual property disputes, foreign-related ecological and environmental damage disputes and foreign-related environmental civil public interest litigation cases.
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