ECUADOR Law and Practice Contributed by: Jorge Sicouret Lynch, María Celeste Alvarado, Julia Rovello and Mateo Viteri, Coronel & Pérez
Regarding the enforcement stage, once recognition has been granted, the foreign judgment becomes an enforcement title and is enforced under the ordinary execution rules of the COGEP. Execution is limited to the concrete implementation of the title. As a first step, the first-instance judge in charge of the enforcement appoints an expert to calculate capital, interest and costs; before that, the creditor has five days to file supporting evidence of recoverable costs. Once the calculation is received, the judge issues the enforce- ment order, requiring the debtor to pay or comply within five days, failing which compulsory enforce- ment follows. The debtor may oppose the enforcement order only on the limited statutory grounds set out in the COGEP, such as payment, settlement, remission, novation, confusion, set-off or loss of the thing due, and only if the relevant event occurred after the judgment became enforceable. Opposition does not stay enforcement and is decided at the enforcement hearing. The debtor may also propose a payment formula, but this does not suspend the proceedings unless accepted by the creditor and, where applicable, by any third parties. If the debtor does not comply, the court orders publi- cation of the enforcement order for the benefit of inter- ested third parties, attachment of the debtor’s assets, and valuation by an expert. The valuation is then dis- cussed at the enforcement hearing, which must be held within a maximum of 15 days after notification of the expert report. If enforcement continues after that hearing, the judge orders the judicial sale of the attached assets, generally through the electronic auc- tion platform of the Council of the Judiciary, unless the law provides for direct delivery to the creditor or the parties agree on another permitted method of sale. The proceedings end once the obligation has been fully extinguished. 9.2 Enforcement of Arbitral Awards Foreign arbitral awards have the same effect as domestic awards and are enforced in the same man- ner, without prior recognition. In judgment No 3232- 19-EP/24, the Constitutional Court held that requiring prior recognition and a certificate of finality as a con- dition for admitting enforcement of a foreign award amounted to an unreasonable barrier to access to
justice and involved the application of rules that are no longer in force. That position was later confirmed in judgment No 6-22-IN/25, in which the Court gave a binding constitutional interpretation to Article 363 (5) of the COGEP, holding that foreign arbitral awards are enforcement titles that do not require recognition. In turn, domestic arbitral awards are likewise enforced in the same manner as last-instance court judgments. Enforcement commences by filing a written applica- tion before the competent ordinary civil judge, namely, the first-instance civil judge of the debtor’s domicile or of the place where executable assets are located, together with a copy of the award. Once filed, the request proceeds under the ordinary enforcement rules described in 9.1 Enforcement of Judgments . The same applies to foreign arbitral awards, except that no prior recognition, certificate of finality, legalisa- tion or other additional formality is required. 9.3 Length of Time There is not a single typical timeframe for enforcement proceedings in Ecuador. The legislation provides some short procedural dead- lines applicable only at early steps of the proceedings: the claimant has five days to submit proof of costs after the court opens the proceedings; after that, a court-appointed expert shall calculate capital, inter- ests, and costs within the term decided by the court (typically seven days); then the court must order the debtor to pay the relevant amount or to oppose that order within five days. After that, the overall duration depends on whether the debtor resists enforcement, the existence and location of executable assets, and whether valuation, attachment and auction measures are required. 9.4 Grounds for Resisting Enforcement In the case of foreign judgments, resistance may arise at two stages. First, the respondent may oppose the recognition application by showing that one or more of the statutory recognition requirements has not been met, including lack of authenticity, lack of finality or res judicata in the state of origin, defects in legalisation or translation, or lack of proper service and due process. Secondly, once the judgment has been recognised
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