Rybalkin, Gortsunyan, Dyakin and Partners (RGD) together with the team of King’s Counsel and solicitors has achieved a remarkably important victory in favour of its client in an over USD 1bln legal proceedings in the British Virgin Islands (BVI) Court.

The adverse parties sought a global anti-suit injunction against RGD’s client in order to restrict current and future litigations in connection with multiple proceedings that the client have been conducting in Russia and Cyprus. RGD team represented by Partner Ilya Rybalkin, Counsels Yan Kalish, Alexander Lazarev, Varvara Voynova and Associate Vladislav Viryasov developed a detailed position in relation to these proceedings and lack of relevance thereof to the BVI litigation. It became possible due to the legal team which included DLA Piper (London), Agon Litigation (BVI), Simon Birt KC and barrister Michael Bolding, who acted for the client in courts of three levels.

In 2020, the BVI Commercial Court refused the injunction in its entirety. In 2021, the Eastern Caribbean Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal against the decision of the first instance court. Finally, the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom refused anti-suit injunction appeals against RGD’s client, awarding the costs to the client. The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom deals exclusively with the most important cases of decisive importance for the legal systems of the British Commonwealth countries. The decisions of this body are of a precedent nature and have priority for the courts of the Commonwealth countries.

This case deals with important issues of international litigation in the jurisdictions that have the Anglo-Saxon system of law. In particular, the courts defined that a request for an anti-suit injunction is available against actions that are vexatious and oppressive, which was not the case. To justify the imposition of an injunction, the parallel litigation must be manifestly hopeless, bogus or entirely without merit. The courts have also established that the merits of a claim should be decided at the forum where this claim is litigated, not in the BVI. Another precedent-setting finding of the court was that, in the absence of a specific dispute resolution clause, a global anti-suit injunction would be inappropriate.

Global anti-suit injunctions are a formidable weapon in cross-border litigation and arbitration proceedings that can predetermine the outcome of the entire process. It is all the more important that the two-year litigation ended in a landslide victory for the client of RGD.