TNAG-2162-FCO40-3093-Legal-matters-between-Hong-Kong-and-China-1990 — Page 35

CONFIDENTIAL

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9.

The President of the Supreme People's Court, Ren Jianxin, has declared that the elimination the problem of judicial bias, known as 'local protectionism', is a priority for the judicial system in the next few years. However many Chinese lawyers and academics agree that this problem will not be resolved until the courts are wrested from the control of local authorities. At present it does not appear that the Central Government has either the funds or the inclination to take on that task. According to Mr. Zhang, the Supreme People's Court currently spends much of its time resolving jurisdiction disputes which involve the courts of more than one province (jurisdiction disputes within a province are resolved by the higher people's court of the province).

III. Recognition and Enforcement

10.

The enforcement of domestic civil judgements in the P.R.C. is carried out through the issue of court orders. If a party fails to comply with a court order, a court may also issue orders to other government authorities to take forcible measures. At present we do not have a detailed understanding of the enforcement process in practice. However Chinese lawyers have commented that the courts do have difficulty in persuading other government bodies to comply with their directions. Mr. Zhang Mao also mentioned that enforcement is commonly directed at cash and bank deposits and asset seizure is unusual.

11.

In cases which require, enforcement outside of the territorial jurisdiction of the court which issued the judgement, the CPL provides that the judgement must be

'entrusted' to the court which has jurisdiction over the person or property that is subject to enforcement. The Supreme People's Court has issued a number of official directives regarding this extra-territorial enforcement process, including several which are directed at the problem of 'local protectionism' which also affects the enforcement process. According to Chinese lawyers it is often impossible to obtain full enforcement of a judgement outside of the jurisdiction in which it was issued. Courts which are entrusted with extra-territorial judgements are known to delay enforcement indefinitely without reason and even to tip off the party subject to enforcement to assist in defeating the judgement.

CONFIDENTIAL