The Dubai International Financial Centre Court – which was launched in the boom days of Gulf expansion in 2004 – last week issued joint guidance on the mutual recognition of judgments with the London High Court in a bid to boost global confidence in its rulings.

Eradicating ignorance

Michael Hwang SC – a Singapore-qualified lawyer who is the court’s chief justice – signed the deal with the head of the English commercial court, Mr Justice Jeremy Cooke. In an interview with The Times newspaper, Mr Justice Hwang says the memorandum of guidance – the first of its kind for either jurisdiction – is designed to ‘eradicate lawyer and client ignorance’.
According to the judge, too many in the legal profession -- and their corporate business clients -- assume that DIFC Court judgments cannot be enforced outside of the limited confines of the Dubai free zone.

Shot in the arm

The Times comments that the deal is a much needed shot in the arm for the Dubai court as it faces stiff competition not only from its aggressive neighbour, the Qatar Financial Centre Civil and Commercial Court, but also in its own backyard in the shape of the Dubai International Arbitration Centre, which several years ago inked a joint venture with the London Court of International Arbitration.
According to the report, the DIFC Court has been dealing with an average of about 100 cases annually, but about two-thirds of that caseload involves relatively minor commercial disputes. The arbitration centre, on the other hand, has about four times that traffic rate.