SWEDEN Law and Practice Contributed by: Anders Leissner, Martin Johansson, Isak Lefvert and Imola Szanto, Advokatfirman Vinge KB
4.3 Timing Whereas the timeline for the processing of a delisting request to the EU Council or United Nations Secre - tariats will vary depending on the circumstances in the case, a court challenge is almost certainly a longer procedure. Annulment proceedings in the EU General Court will normally take well over a year, often longer, as will appeals proceedings in the Court of Justice. 5. Trade and Export Restrictions 5.1 Services Trade and export restrictions regarding services are adopted by the United Nations and the European Union. As noted in 1.4.1 Types of Sanctions , Sweden does not maintain any sanctions regimes adopted at national level, and this principle extends to trade and export sanctions. Where applicable, trade sanctions on services are specified within the relevant sanctions framework. For example, EU Regulation 2022/355, containing export and import restrictions against Belarus, and Regulation 833/2014 concerning Russia prescribe such measures, and Regulation 2022/263 concerns export of services from the occupied territories of Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk and Luhansk. 5.2 Goods There are multiple trade and export restrictions regard - ing goods. These restrictions are regulated in the same manner as those pertaining to services, meaning that sanctions regimes established by the United Nations and the European Union, where applicable, specify prohibitions on the export or import of goods within the relevant regulatory framework. For example, the EU regulations mentioned in 5.1 Ser- vices all include multiple prohibitions relating to the export and import of goods, ranging from military and dual-use items to industrial and luxury products, and similar prohibitions can be found in other EU sanctions regulations. United Nations import or export bans are enshrined in UN Security Council resolutions, such as Resolution 1747 (2007), which prohibits the procure - ment, import or transport of arms and related materiel of all types from Iran. This prohibition is implemented
through several Swedish transposition measures, such as the Military Equipment Act ( Lag (1992:1300) om krigsmateriel ). 6. Civil Litigation and Arbitration 6.1 Force Majeure As far as is known, the Swedish courts have made no recent decisions assessing sanctions compliance as a contractual breach. Swedish law affords parties broad freedom of con - tract, and parties are generally free to agree whether, and to what extent, the imposition of sanctions is to constitute a force majeure event or otherwise relieve a party from performance. In the absence of an express sanctions clause, the interpretation of any agreed force majeure wording will govern the outcome, and the parties’ allocation of risk will as a basic rule be respected. Where the contract is silent, the position is governed by general Swedish contract law principles. Force majeure is not expressly defined in a Swedish statute, but it is a well-recognised principle of contrac - tual interpretation in Swedish law. When confronting force majeure defences, Swedish law often draws on the closely related control liability principles mainly enshrined in Sections 27 and 57 of the Swedish Sale of Goods Act ( köplagen (1990:931)) and Article 79 of the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods, although force majeure and statutory control liability should not be treated as identical con - cepts. On that basis, Swedish law allows for sanctions to constitute force majeure where they make per - formance unlawful or practically impossible, or in exceptional cases are considered objectively to be so burdensome that performance cannot reasonably be required. In line with the principles of Sections 27 and 57 of the Swedish Sale of Goods Act, a party would – in theory – need to show that the imposition of sanctions was outside its control, could not reason - ably have been foreseen at the time of contracting, and could not reasonably have been avoided or over - come, including by using alternative lawful means of performance or seeking available licences or exemp - tions. Whether these conditions are met depends on
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