Soc Allemande Shirring v Soc Britannique Shirring

• Jurisdiction: Egipto
• Court: Court of Cassation (Egypt)
• Date: 23 June 1955

Egypt, Court of Cassation.

Socit Allemande Shirring

and

Socit Britannique Shirring.

Treaties Interpretation of Rules of Property Interpretation by reference to municipal law of the Parties The law of Egypt.

War Effects of outbreak of On enemy subjects with regard to their property rights Trade-marks owned by German company Whether trade-mark can be sequestrated as separate property Whether Paris Convention of December 21, 1945, involves confiscation of German trade-marks The law of Egypt.

The Facts.A German Company (hereinafter referred to as Shirring (Germany)) carrying on business in Germany owned certain trade-marks. German property in Egypt was sequestrated during the Second World War and a Sequestrator General for German Property appointed. The English Company Shirring (hereinafter referred to as Shirring (England)) made an agreement with the Sequestrator General of German Property on December 2, 1947, under which the Sequestrator General authorized Shirring (England) to use the trade-marks in question for a period of ten years from January 1, 1948. Shirring (Germany) brought an action on July 10, 1948, before the Mixed Court, Cairo, seeking the cancellation of the trade-mark, which it claimed was its property, which had been registered by Shirring (England). Shirring (England) resisted this action, on the grounds that Shirring (Germany) had established neither its ownership of the trade-mark nor, in view of the war legislation of the Allied States and of Egypt and also of international conventions, its capacity to act. Shirring (England) also requested that the Sequestrator General of German Property be made a party to the proceedings. On June 11, 1949, the Mixed Court, Cairo, found in favour of Shirring (Germany).

Shirring (England) appealed, relying on the agreement with the Sequestrator General of December 11, 1947. On May 9, 1951, the Court of Appeal upheld the appeal on the grounds (i) that Egyptian law deprived the German Company of recourse to the courts, that right belonging exclusively to the Sequestrator General of German Property; (ii) that the trade-marks belonging to the German company had been sequestrated before the decree of January 3, 1947, lifting the prohibition against German commercial companies and restoring to enemy countries the right to trade and to have recourse to the courts; (iii) that Article 19 of Law No. 57 of 1939 concerning trade-marks gave to them a financial value independent of the business to which they belonged, and that this made it possible to dispose of them independently of the business and subjected them to the control of the Sequestrator General in the same way as any other enemy goods found on Egyptian territory.

On appeal by Shirring (Germany),

Held: that the appeal must be allowed. A trade-mark was not an item of property separate from the business...