Dear Sirs,

On August 2, 2010 the Federal Law “On the alterations to the Arbitrazh Procedural Code of the Russian Federation” (“The Law”) was published. The Law introduces significant alterations to the Arbitrazh Procedural Code in a part of procedural time limits, the jurisdiction of economic disputes arising out of administrative and other public legal relations, and also some other issues of arbitrazh court proceedings. The Law will come into force since November 1, 2010.

The Law is aimed to optimize arbitrazh courts operation and reduce court overwork so each case could be considered more thoroughly, thus improving the efficiency of justice.

We would like to draw your attention to the essential provisions of the Law:

1                    The Law stipulates the possibility to file procedural documents via the official Web-site of the arbitrazh court and to take part in hearings using video conference communication.

Furthermore, according to the amendments the documents received by fax, electronic or other communications including via the Internet, as well as the documents signed with the electronic digital signature or with other equivalents of a handwritten signature, may be used as written evidence (in cases and in the procedure stipulated by legal acts or contracts or in the rulings of the Supreme Arbitrazh Court intra vires).

2                    The Law introduces alterations to item 1 of Art. 19 of the Arbitrazh Procedural Code, in accordance to which arbitrazh court assessors may be involved in the court hearing in the first instance only provided that “the case is extra complicated and/or there is a necessity to involve specialists in the spheres of economics, finances and administration”. Moreover, in the application concerning the involvement of arbitrazh court assessors there should be a proof of the hardness of the case in question and/or the necessity to use special knowledge. So the parties to disputes will not be able to temporize proceedings though formal involvement of arbitrazh court assessors.

3                    The Law introduces a presumption of recognizing the facts underlying the position of the party of the case if such facts were not directly argued by the party or disagreement with such facts arises from other circumstances supported by the arguments related to the substance of the claim.

4                    The legislators introduce amendments to Art. 112 of the Arbitrazh Procedural Code stipulating the possibility of transposition of judicial expenses to the abusing party.

Additionally, the parties can file a motion for reimbursement of the legal costs, including the costs for legal representatives, only within the term of up to 6 months since the last judicial act has come into effect.

5                    In the Arbitrazh Procedural Code there are norms concerning the requirements to the proper notification of the parties. The Law makes alterations to these norms and stipulates new circumstances when parties should be considered notified properly:

–      when the receiver waives the receiving of the copy of a judicial act and this refusal is formalized either by the postal organization or by the court;

–      when despite the postal office notification the receiver doesn’t come to get the copy of the judicial act;

–      when the copy of the judicial act is not handled to the receiver because he is absent at the specified address;

–      when the notification is handled to the authorized representative of the branch office or the representative office of the legal entity;

–      when the judicial summons is handled to the attorney of the person involved in a case.

6                    The order of record-keeping of the court hearings data is changed. Now in the course of each trial of the first instance arbitrazh audio record-keeping shall be held and a written record of the court hearing shall be drawn up.

7                    There are also amendments concerning the way of appealing the judgments of the arbitrazh courts of first instance.

Unless otherwise provided by the Arbitrazh Procedural Code, the judgment of the arbitrazh court of first instance may be appealed in arbitrazh court of cassation provided the judgment was a subject matter of the arbitrazh court of appeal or the arbitrazh court of appeal refused to restore the period for the appealing.

In accordance with the amendments it is impossible to file a cassation claim for administrative offences if the amount of the administrative fine does not exceed RUR 100,000 (approx. USD 3,250) for legal entities and RUR 5,000 (approx. USD 160) for sole proprietors, for the appeal of the judgment if it was the subject matter of the arbitrazh court of appeal and for the decision of the arbitrazh court of appeal except on the unconditional procedural grounds of appeal stipulated in item 4 of Art. 288 of the Arbitrazh Procedural Code (item 4.1 of Art. 206 of the Arbitrazh Procedural Code).

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We hope the information above is helpful for you.

For more information on ALRUD Dispute resolution practice please visit our Web-site

or contact directly ALRUD Senior Partner Vassily Rudomino [email protected]

and Partner Alexander Zharskiy [email protected]

 

Kind regards,

ALRUD Law Firm

Please note: We would like to draw your attention to the informational purposes of this newsletter and to the fact that it cannot be a ground for making a decision in each particular case.