Rules on Jurisdiction and Recognition or Enforcement of Judgments in Specialised Conventions on Transport in the Aftermath of TNT: Dynamite or Light in the Dark?

Pursuant to Article 71(1) of Regulation No. 1215/2012, of 12 December, on Jurisdiction and the Recognition and Enforcement of Judgments in Civil and Commercial Matters (Brussels Ia or Recast Regulation), the Regulation “shall not affect any conventions to which the Member States are parties and which, in relation to particular matters, govern jurisdiction or the recognition or enforcement of judgments”. The rule has not yet been the subject of a preliminary ruling by the CJEU, but there are four decisions on its immediate – and virtually identical1 – predecessor in Article 71 of the Brussels I Regulation2, three of which deal with the 1956 Geneva Convention on the Contract for the International Carriage of Goods by Road (CMR)3, a treaty that came into force long before the Brussels I Regulation did. Most of the decisions by national courts on jurisdiction rules in conventions on particular matters are also related to the transport sector. By contrast, the subject matter of the fourth and most recent judgment delivered by the CJEU is different: it examines the validity of a provision on jurisdiction contained in a convention enacted after the entry into force of the Brussels I Regulation, the Benelux Convention on Intellectual Property of 25 February 20054, a situation that, as shall be seen in the next section, is not covered by Article 71 of the Brussels Ia Regulation