EGYPT Law and Practice Contributed by: Amr A. Abbas, Ahmed Abdel Hakeem, Khaled Abou El Wafa and Adham Ahmed Saied, Matouk Bassiouny & Hennawy
Furthermore, the courts will not enforce a foreign judg - ment where Egyptian courts have exclusive jurisdic - tion to decide on a dispute – for example, a dispute involving real estate situated in Egypt. Finally, it should be noted that Egypt ratified the Al Riyadh Arab Convention for Judicial Cooperation of 6 April 1983 in 2018, which provides for reciprocal recognition and enforcement of judicial judgments, service of judicial documents, and broader judicial co-operation between the contracting Arab States. However, a judgment issued by one of the contracting states cannot be enforced in Egypt if: • it is contrary to the provisions of Islamic Sharia, the Constitution, public order, or public morals; • it was rendered in absentia and the defendant was not properly served with the claim or judgment in a manner that enabled them to defend themselves; • the rules concerning legal representation of per - sons lacking or having limited capacity were not observed; • the dispute in respect of which recognition is sought has already been decided by a final judg - ment between the same parties, concerning the same subject matter and cause of action, and such judgment has acquired res judicata effect in Egypt or in another contracting State and has been rec - ognised in the requested State; or • the dispute is already pending before the Egyptian courts between the same parties, concerning the same subject matter and cause of action, provided that the case was filed in Egypt prior to the institu - tion of proceedings before the court that issued the judgment. 3.4 Process of Enforcing Foreign Judgments Subject to the application of the relevant conventions and treaties, Egyptian law requires the party seek - ing enforcement of a foreign judgment to obtain an exequatur. Subject to the recognition and enforce - ment requirements, foreign judgments are enforced in accordance with the same requirements as domestic judgments. A writ of enforcement of a foreign judg - ment should be filed before the competent court of first instance, as per the normal procedure for the ini - tiation of a lawsuit before such courts.
In practice, the applicant party submits a number of documents, including: • the original version of the foreign judgment along with its official Arabic translation; • a certificate ensuring that the judgment is final according to the laws of the country in which the judgment was rendered; and • a copy of the relevant convention, treaty or agree - ment between the issuing country and Egypt (if any). The request for enforcement is then submitted to a court with jurisdiction over the place of enforcement. The competent court will render its exequatur without reviewing the merits of the foreign judgment. However, the court must ascertain that the conditions referred to in 3.1 Legal Issues Concerning Enforcement of Foreign Judgments are fulfilled. Once the exequatur is issued, the applicant must serve it on the defendant. If the defendant does not accept the judgment voluntarily, the applicant may seek compulsory enforcement of the judgment. 3.5 Costs and Time Taken to Enforce Foreign Judgments In the absence of any exceptional circumstances, the receipt of an exequatur on a foreign judgment takes around six to 12 months. The court’s decision to issue an exequatur is subject to appeal, which takes around six months to decide. The costs incurred in the enforcement of a foreign judgment consist of a filing fee of approximately EGP1,000, while a fee of 2.5% of the amounts subject to the enforcement procedures (not the total awarded amounts) is charged for each enforcement measure. This fee could be paid more than once, depending on the nature of the enforcement measures against the defendant’s assets. However, the 2.5% fee will be retrieved from the counterparty – ie, added to the amounts collected from the counterparty. 3.6 Challenging Enforcement of Foreign Judgments Generally, the party against whom enforcement of a foreign judgment is sought may argue non-fulfilment
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