N v X

• Jurisdiction: Egipto
• Date: 07 March 1956
• Court: Court of Cassation (Egypt)

Egypt, Court of Cassation (Civil Chamber).

(Gaber, Sayed, Wahed Ali, Etlem, Youssef JJ.)

N.

and

X.

Treaties — Interpretation of — Principles and Rules of — Comparison of Languages of Text of Treaty.

Treaties — Operation and Enforcement of — Effect in Municipal Law — Treaty as Prevailing over Inconsistent Municipal Legislation — Arrangement concerning Notification of Judicial Process — Supremacy over Inconsistent Procedural Law of One of the Parties — Promulgation of Treaty — The Law of Egypt.

The Facts.—On July 12, 1950, N. obtained in the High Court of Khartoum a judgment against X. for payment of approximately £E2,500. He later applied to the Tribunal of First Instance of Cairo for the “executory formula” to be affixed to the judgment. On June 14, 1951, the Tribunal refused to give the exequatur on the ground that the applicant had failed to comply with the requirements of the Arrangement of 1902 between Egypt and the Sudan concerning summonses and other judicial process. On appeal, the Court of Appeal of Cairo on May 8, 1952, confirmed the judgment of the Tribunal. N. appealed further, his principal contentions being:

I. The Tribunal of First Instance had wrongly applied the Decision of May 17, 1902, of the Council of Ministers ratifying the “Arrangement” concluded between the Governments of Egypt and Sudan. It appeared from the provisions of Articles 1 and 4 of that Arrangement that each of the Governments mentioned undertook to give notice of summonses and other judicial process which might be transmitted to it for that purpose by the other Government, in the manner provided in the Arrangement. In such case, it would be for the Government receiving the documents to proceed to give notice of them in the manner prescribed in the Arrangement. The provisions of the Arrangement did not require the Government which desired to proceed to the notification of judicial proceedings in the territory of the other Government, to send the process to be notified to the other Government, but rather to proceed to the notification of the said process in the manner prescribed by its own municipal legislation. This was shown by the fact that Article 1 of the Arrangement provides: “Each of the two Governments undertakes in principle …” and the expression “in principle” connotes an idea of “time”; it must be so understood because the Government of the Sudan promulgated laws to regulate the notification of judicial process for persons resident outside the Sudan. Article 61 of the Recueil des Lois promulgated for the Sudan on May 1, 1925, provides that notification shall be sent by registered post if regular postal communication exists between the addressee and the place where the Court is situated.

II. The judgment appealed from was in error in holding that the notification of the summons and the notification of the judgment transmitted through the post to the respondent to the appeal were invalid under Article 61 of the Sudanese Recueil des Lois, despite the fact that the Decision of May 17, 1902, of the Council of Ministers did not provide for such invalidity as a sanction for failure to comply with the provisions...