UKRAINE Law and Practice Contributed by: Oleksandr Mamunya, Ganna Prokhorova, Nataliia Badora and Ihor Kharytonov, Mamunya IP
requests is mandatory (or otherwise requires providing a detailed justification for the inability to disclose information or documents) and must be made within five working days. Demands for Evidence from a Court Effective Ukrainian procedural law envisages the mechanism for securing evidence, in par- ticular, by demanding it from any person within the pending court proceedings. Measures to secure evidence shall be taken if there is reason to believe that evidence may be lost in the future or that its collection or filing may subsequently become impossible or difficult. An application for securing evidence may be filed with the court either before or after filing a statement of claim. If such an application is filed before filing a statement of claim, an applicant should file a statement of claim within ten days as from the date of the court ruling on secur- ing evidence. Failure to file a statement of claim within the specified period, as well as the return of a statement of claim or refusal to commence proceedings, will lead the court to revoke its rul- ing on securing evidence no later than the next day after the expiration of the said period. A ruling on securing evidence is binding on any According to the effective procedural law, a statement of claim shall include the content of the claims; ie, the remedy that a plaintiff requests a court to apply, a statement of the circum- stances in which the plaintiff substantiates their claims, and evidence to support them, and other information. A claim for protection of intellectual property rights is no exception. person to whom it is addressed. 2.11 Initial Pleading Standards
In a statement of claim, a plaintiff shall describe in detail the cause of action and provide all avail- able evidence. Submission of evidence at a lat- er stage of the trial is allowed only if a plaintiff proves good reasons for failure to submit evi- dence along with the statement of claim. 2.12 Representative or Collective Action The Ukrainian legal system does not envisage representative or collective actions. It is possible, however, for several plaintiffs to jointly file a claim, if: • the subject matter of a dispute concerns the joint rights or obligations of several plaintiffs or defendants; • the rights or obligations of several plaintiffs or defendants arose on the same grounds; and/ or the subject of the dispute is homogeneous rights and responsibilities. 2.13 Restrictions on Assertion of an Intellectual Property Right During a patent dispute consideration, a defend- ant may allege abuse of the right to sue by a plaintiff; however, in practice, courts rarely apply the respective procedural consequences of abuse of rights, and the relevant jurisprudence is not yet well-developed. Unfair actions in the market may be considered a violation of the Law on Protection against Unfair Competition. The Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine or its territorial branches shall consider such cases and impose fines on the infringers.
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