FINLAND Law and Practice Contributed by: Pekka Tuunainen, Pekka Tuunainen Attorneys Ltd
In these cases, Finnish courts have jurisdiction only when one (or more) of the following criteria is met: • joint application is made; • the spouses were last habitually resident in Finland and one of them still resides in Finland; • the respondent spouse is habitually resident in Finland; • the applicant is habitually resident in Finland and resided there for at least a year immediately before the application was filed; or • the applicant is habitually resident in Finland and resided there for at least six months immediately before the application was made, and is a Finnish citizen. This means that a Finnish resident cannot apply for divorce immediately when they move back to Finland from a foreign country; application cannot be made for at least six or 12 months. In national legislation, there is also a back-up clause for jurisdiction. If the applicant is resident in Finland or has other close links to Finland and cannot suc ‑ cessfully start divorce proceedings in the foreign state where either spouse is domiciled, or if this would cause unreasonable inconvenience and the admissibility of the matter in Finland is justified in view of the circum ‑ stances, Finnish courts may rule they have jurisdiction on the matter. This usually requires extraordinary situ ‑ ations – eg, war or legal impossibility to file divorce in the other state. Jurisdiction can be contested if the above-men ‑ tioned requirement for jurisdiction is not met. Courts are required to determine jurisdiction ex officio, but sometimes an applicant can give false information, or the registers determining residency are not accurate. In such cases, a party to a divorce proceeding must oppose jurisdiction when responding to court for the first time. If a divorce proceeding is already filed in some other jurisdiction before being filed in Finland, it is possible to apply to stay proceedings in Finland and the Finnish divorce procedure is definitively ended. If one of the parties can prove that the other divorce proceeding
is not real or that they will not get a fair trial, the pro ‑ cedure in Finland may continue.
2. Financial Proceedings 2.1 Choice of Jurisdiction in Financial Proceedings
A Finnish court has jurisdiction for financial proceed ‑ ings if divorce is filed successfully in a Finnish court (ie, Finland has jurisdiction in the divorce proceed ‑ ings). This is the case when both spouses are resident in Finland, in which case Finnish courts always have jurisdiction on financial matters. According to the Brussels IIa Regulation, this juris ‑ dictional connection with divorce proceeding has limitations if a spouse has applied for divorce on the grounds they have been habitually resident in Fin ‑ land and resided there for at least a year immediately before the application was filed, or if they are habitu ‑ ally resident in Finland and resided there for at least six months immediately before the application was made and are a Finnish citizen. In these cases, the jurisdiction of a Finnish court over financial matters is subject to the spouse’s agreement, even though the divorce case has jurisdiction in Finland. In other cases, Finland courts have jurisdiction if (not depending on divorce proceeding): • the spouses were last habitually resident in Finland and one of them still resides there; • the respondent is habitually resident in Finland; and • both spouses are Finnish citizens. In these cases, spouses can make an agreement on jurisdiction, but agreed jurisdiction is limited to the country where the marriage was concluded, or to the country of choice of law of the spouses’ marital prop ‑ erty regime. Jurisdiction can be contested if the above-mentioned requirement for jurisdiction is not met or if spouses have agreed on jurisdiction. Courts are required to determine jurisdiction ex officio, but this is not always possible due to lack of information, in which case
125 CHAMBERS.COM
Powered by FlippingBook