Justia International Law Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff was a Syrian national living in California as a legal permanent resident and is now a U.S. citizen. She is not and has never been a Kuwaiti national. In 2014, Plaintiff entered into a written employment contract with the Consulate to work as a secretary. Plaintiff alleges that the Consulate created a hostile work environment by harassing, discriminating, and retaliating against her on the basis of her gender, religion, and Syrian national origin, violated various wage and hour laws, and breached her employment contract. Claiming that she was constructively terminated from her employment, she filed suit.The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court’s denial of the Consulate’s motion to dismiss. The commercial activity exception to the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, 28 U.S.C. 1605(a)(2), applied. The employment of diplomatic, civil service, or military personnel is governmental and the employment of other personnel is commercial unless the foreign state shows that the employee’s duties included “powers peculiar to sovereigns.” The district court properly exercised its discretion in finding that Plaintiff, who was employed as an administrative assistant, was not a civil servant and that her duties did not include “powers peculiar to sovereigns.” View "Mohammad v. General Consulate of the State of Kuwait in Los Angeles" on Justia Law

After P&ID petitioned for confirmation of an arbitral award against Nigeria, Nigeria moved to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction and asserted sovereign immunity under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA). The district court denied the motion on the ground that Nigeria impliedly waived sovereign immunity by joining The Convention on the Recognition and Enforcement of Foreign Arbitral Awards (New York Convention).Following its determination that it has appellate jurisdiction under the collateral order doctrine, the DC Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of Nigeria's motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction on different grounds, concluding that a foreign court's order ostensibly setting aside an arbitral award has no bearing on the district court's jurisdiction and is instead an affirmative defense properly suited for consideration at the merits stage. In this case, because the requirements of the arbitration exception under 28 U.S.C. 1605(a)(6) are satisfied, Nigeria’s sovereign immunity has been abrogated. View "Process and Industrial Developments Limited v. Federal Republic of Nigeria" on Justia Law

In 1944, German troops entered Hungary. The Hungarian government and Nazi collaborators confiscated the Herzog Collection, “one of Europe’s great private collections of art, and the largest in Hungary.” Some pieces were transported to Germany, others were taken by the Hungarian government. The Herzogs fled Hungary and later attempted to reclaim the Collection, including through the Hungarian courts. In the U.S., they sued Hungary and three art museums, arguing that failure to return the artworks breached bailment contracts and constituted conversion and unjust enrichment.In 2013, the D.C. Circuit held the suit was not barred by the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), 28 U.S.C. 1604–05, and found that jurisdiction was not inconsistent with international agreements. After discovery, the D.C. Circuit affirmed that the action could proceed under FSIA’s expropriation exception; remanded for consideration whether that exception applies to 19 artworks that were temporarily returned to the Herzogs; ordered the dismissal of Hungary (citing FSIA); and ordered that the Herzogs be allowed to amend their complaint under the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery Act of 2016. The district court complied and added a new defendant, Hungarian National Asset Management (MNV).The D.C. Circuit affirmed, rejecting arguments that MNV is shielded by Hungary’s sovereign immunity, that the district court violated the remand mandate by allowing the addition of MNV, that failure to join an indispensable party precluded action against the remaining defendants, and that the principle of prudential exhaustion required dismissal. View "De Csepel v. Republic of Hungary" on Justia Law

Cambodian villagers who alleged that they were trafficked into Thailand and subjected to forced labor at seafood processing factories sued under the civil remedy provision of the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, 18 U.S.C. 1595. The Ninth Circuit affirmed summary judgment in favor of the defendants.Section 1596 authorizes extraterritorial application of the Act for specific criminal trafficking offenses. Even assuming that section 1595 permits a private cause of action for extraterritorial violations of section 1596's substantive provisions if other requirements are satisfied, certain defendants were not “present in the United States” at any time relevant to the lawsuit as section 1596 requires. Even if section 1596 requires foreign companies to possess nothing more than minimum contacts with the United States, the plaintiffs did not meet that standard. The record did not support either specific or general jurisdiction as a basis for finding minimum contacts. The court rejected an argument that certain defendants were present in the U.S. through an agency relationship or joint venture with a Delaware LLC with its principal place of business in California. The plaintiffs failed to establish a triable issue that a Thai company registered to conduct business in California knowingly benefitted from the alleged human trafficking and forced labor abuses, financially and by accessing a steady stream of imported seafood. View "Ratha v. Phatthana Seafood Co. Ltd." on Justia Law

Sacks is a law firm with a 20-year history of working with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). In 2011, IMF hired Sacks to negotiate disputed claims of various contractors that worked on the renovation of its headquarters. The parties’ contract asserts IMF’s immunity from suit and provides that any disputes not settled by mutual agreement shall be resolved by arbitration. In a subsequent fee dispute between Sacks and IMF, Sacks filed a demand for arbitration with the AAA. The arbitration panel awarded Sacks $39,918.82 plus interest but denied Sacks’ claim of underpayment in connection with earlier work.Sacks sued the Fund, claiming that the award should be vacated pursuant to the D.C. Code as “the result of misconduct by the arbitrators.” IMF removed the case to federal court and moved to dismiss it on immunity grounds pursuant to its Articles of Agreement, given effect in the U.S. by the Bretton Woods Act, 22 U.S.C. 286h. Sacks asserted the contract waived immunity by expressly providing for arbitration pursuant to the AAA Rules, which contemplate courts’ entry of judgment on arbitral awards. The D.C. Circuit affirmed the dismissal of the suit. The AAA Rules and D.C. law contemplate judicial involvement in the enforcement of arbitral awards, so arguably the contract also does so but an international organization's waiver of the immunity must be explicit. The parties' contract expressly retains the IMF’s immunity, reiterating it even within the arbitration clause. View "Leonard A. Sacks & Associates P.C. v. International Monetary Fund" on Justia Law

Ali sought to pursue 42 U.S.C. 1983 proceedings challenging as unconstitutional an executive order of Maryland’s Governor that prohibits boycotts of Israel by business entities that bid on the state’s procurement contracts. According to the Initial Complaint, “Ali is a computer software engineer who wishes to submit bids for government software project contracts but is barred from doing so due to the presence of mandatory ‘No Boycott of Israel’ clauses.”The district court dismissed with prejudice Ali’s lawsuit for want of Article III standing to sue. The Fourth Circuit affirmed but modified the judgment to provide that the dismissal is without prejudice. The court first disagreed with Ali’s interpretation of the Order. The Order indicates that if a business entity has engaged in anti-Israel national origin discrimination in the process of preparing a bid for a state procurement contract, the entity is barred from being awarded the contract; if the entity has engaged in a boycott of Israel entirely unrelated to the bid formation process, the Order is of no relevance. The court rejected Ali’s argument that the certification requirement constitutes an unconstitutionally vague loyalty oath. The Order does not require the entity to pledge any loyalty to Israel or profess any other beliefs. View "Ali v. Hogan" on Justia Law

Wye sued Iraq. The district court denied Iraq’s motion to dismiss on sovereign immunity grounds and entered judgment in Wye’s favor years later. An intervening Fourth Circuit ruling rejected Iraq’s contention that none of the exceptions in the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, 28 U.S.C. 1602, applied to Wye’s breach of contract claims; because Wye alleged that it had engaged in acts inside the U.S. under the contract, the lawsuit could proceed under the second clause of the FSIA’s commercial activities exception, which abrogates foreign sovereign immunity with respect to claims that are “based upon . . . an act performed in the United States in connection with commercial activity of the foreign state elsewhere.”The D.C. Circuit vacated. Iraq’s participation in the trial did not implicitly waive its sovereign immunity. The law of the case doctrine does not require adherence to the Fourth Circuit’s conclusions. The D.C. Circuit concluded that section 1605(a)(2) does not apply to this case. A plausible basis for sustaining the district court’s jurisdictional ruling can be found in the commercial activity exception’s third clause, abrogating immunity if the action is “based upon . . . an act outside the territory of the United States in connection with a commercial activity of the foreign state elsewhere and that act causes a direct effect in the United States.” The district court is best positioned to determine whether Iraq’s breach of contract caused “direct effects” in the U.S. View "Wye Oak Technology, Inc. v. Republic of Iraq" on Justia Law

Berg, a resident of South Carolina, sought recovery of art taken by the Nazis following the German invasion of the Netherlands. Berg’s grandfather was a partner in Firma D. Katz, which owned art galleries specializing in the sale of paintings by Dutch Old Masters. Following World War II, much of the stolen art was returned to the Netherlands by the U.S. military under Collection Point Agreements; the Netherlands agreed to hold the art as “custodians pending the determination of the lawful owners thereof.” Firma D. Katz was liquidated in 1974. The artworks have not been returned to the heirs of its partners. In the District of South Carolina, Berg sued the Kingdom of the Netherlands; its Ministry of Education, Culture & Science, its Cultural Heritage Agency (RCE), and municipal museums in the Netherlands holding the artworks.The Fourth Circuit affirmed that the Ministry and RCE, are political subdivisions of the Netherlands and do not lose Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA), 28 U.S.C. 1602 immunity for artworks located outside of the U.S. which were expropriated in violation of international law. As to the museums, venue was improper in South Carolina under U.S.C. 1391(f). View "Berg v. Kingdom of the Netherlands" on Justia Law

The Second Circuit vacated the district court's order vacating its earlier grant of Nigeria's application for discovery from VR under 28 U.S.C. 1782, holding that the district court's decision was based on an error of law, and thus amounted to an abuse of discretion as it effectively erected an impermissible extra-statutory barrier to discovery under section 1782. The court explained that the Treaty Between the Government of the United States of America and the Federal Republic of Nigeria on Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters by its plain terms does not restrict Nigeria's use of other lawful means to access evidence in the United States for use in criminal matters. Rather, it expands such access, supplementing rather than replacing other evidence-gathering tools such as section 1782. Therefore, Nigeria does not circumvent the Treaty by applying directly to the district court for discovery under section 1782.The court also concluded that the district court erred by concluding that Nigeria's potential use of the discovery materials sought in a related proceeding challenging an arbitration award before an English court would be "improper" and by considering such potential use as a negative factor in addressing Nigeria's section 1782 application. Accordingly, the court remanded for further consideration. View "Federal Republic of Nigeria v. VR Advisory Services, Ltd." on Justia Law

Defendant, a citizen and resident of France charged with violating the Commodity Exchange Act, appealed the district court's memorandum order applying the fugitive disentitlement doctrine and denying her motions to dismiss the indictment on grounds of extraterritoriality and due process.After determining that it has jurisdiction to review the order disentitling defendant, the court reversed and remanded for further proceedings to consider or reconsider the merits of her motions to dismiss. The court agreed with defendant that it has jurisdiction to review the fugitive disentitlement ruling pursuant to the collateral order doctrine. The court held that defendant is not a fugitive, and that, even if she were, the district court abused its discretion in concluding that disentitlement was justified. The court explained that fugitivity implies some action by defendant to distance herself from the United States or frustrate arrest, but she took no such action. The court concluded, however, that it lacked jurisdiction to review the merits of the extraterritoriality and due process challenges and dismissed the appeal to that extent. View "United States v. Sindzingre" on Justia Law