NORWAY Law and Practice Contributed by: Trond Hatland, Per Ole Svor, Henrik Fabian Torgrimsby and Anders Eide Røyneberg, Advokatfirmaet Thommessen AS
5.4 Standard of Judicial Review for Jurisdiction/Admissibility
consider necessary based on the subject matter of the dispute, pursuant to Section 19 of the Arbitration Act. An interim relief ordered by the arbitral tribunal is bind - ing upon the parties but is not enforceable according to Norwegian law, as provisions for this are not con - tained in the Norwegian Enforcement Act of 26 June 1992 No 86, nor in Chapter 10 of the Arbitration Act. In practice, most parties will adhere to an arbitral tri - bunal’s order for interim relief to show respect for the authority of the arbitral tribunal. 6.2 Role of Courts The parties may pursue a claim for interim relief in the ordinary Norwegian courts, pursuant to Section 8 of the Arbitration Act. Interim relief may also be sought in foreign-seated arbitrations; see Section 1, paragraph 2 of the Arbitration Act. The Norwegian rules on inter - im measures give the courts quite a lot of flexibility to grant arrests, or to issue orders preventing a party from certain actions or prescribing a party to perform certain actions. The Arbitration Act does not contain any provisions regarding emergency arbitrators; this depends on the parties’ agreement. Emergency arbitrators are not common in Norwegian arbitrations. 6.3 Security for Costs According to Section 41 of the Arbitration Act, the arbitral tribunal may order the parties to provide secu - rity for the costs of the arbitral tribunal, unless the parties and the arbitral tribunal have agreed otherwise. The arbitral tribunal may terminate the arbitration pro - ceedings if such security is not provided. If a party fails to provide security as ordered, the other party may provide the security in full or bring the dispute before the ordinary courts, unless the parties have agreed otherwise.
As a general rule, in the judicial review, the ordinary courts will make a full and independent assessment of the relevant facts and of the applicable legal sources, based on the grounds invoked by the parties. 5.5 Breach of Arbitration Agreement If a party commences court proceedings in the ordi - nary courts in breach of an arbitration agreement before the arbitration proceedings are initiated, the ordinary courts are obliged to dismiss the case pursu - ant to Section 7 of the Arbitration Act, provided that the other party requests dismissal no later than when addressing the merits of the case. As stated in 3.3 National Courts’ Approach , the courts are required to dismiss a case brought before them where arbitration proceedings have already been initi - ated, unless the arbitration agreement is found to be invalid, or due to other reasons cannot be carried out. Case law dictates that the evaluation of whether the parties have entered into an arbitration agreement must be restrictive. However, if the courts find that the parties have entered into an arbitration agreement, such agreements are held invalid in exceptional cases only. This is due to Norwegian contract law’s generally strict criteria to finding contract provisions void. 5.6 Jurisdiction Over Third Parties As stated in 13.5 Binding of Third Parties , the general principle under Norwegian law is that a contract is only binding for the parties of the contract. Therefore, the main rule is that a third party is not bound by an arbitration agreement or an award issued pursuant to this agreement when said third party has not entered into the agreement or otherwise has not accepted to be bound by the agreement.
6. Preliminary and Interim Relief 6.1 Types of Relief
7. Procedure 7.1 Governing Rules
Unless the parties have agreed otherwise, the arbitral tribunal may, at the request of a party, order any party to take such interim measures as the tribunal may
Chapter 6 of the Arbitration Act (Sections 20–30) sets out detailed provisions governing the procedure of the arbitration. In the absence of agreement between the parties, the provisions in Chapter 6 will apply. It should
581 CHAMBERS.COM
Powered by FlippingBook