PRACTICE — Claim form — Alternative Service — Claimant seeking to effect alternative service in Sudan — No express permission under Sudanese law for alternative form of service — Sudanese law not contravened by alternative service — Whether service of claim form effective — CPR rr 6.24, 6.8

Habib Bank Ltd v Central Bank of Sudan (formerly known as Bank of Sudan) [2006] EWHC 1767 (Comm), (Practice Note)

Field J: 18 July 2006

When granting permission for service out of the jurisdiction under CPR r 6.24 the court could permit an alternative method of service under CPR r 6.8 provided it did not contravene the law of the country where service was to be effected.

Field J so held when allowing the claim of the claimant, Habib Bank Ltd, a company incorporated in Pakistan, for reimbursement in respect of payments made under two confirmed letters of credit. Its claim was made against the issuing bank, the Central Bank of Sudan, the national bank of Sudan. Service of the claim form through diplomatic channels having proved impracticable and subject to very extensive delays, Habib Bank had obtained permission to serve the claim form on officials of the Central Bank of Sudan in Khartoum.

FIELD J said that although the notes to CPR r 6.24 concerning service out of the jurisdiction stated that the function of that rule was to prevent service by a method which the law of the place of service did not permit, this note was misleading. It was implicit in CPR r 6.24 that the court might permit any alternative method of service under CPR r 6.8 so long as it did not contravene the law of the country where service was to be effected. Shiblaq v Sadikoglu [2004] EWHC 1890 was not authority for the proposition that service abroad must be expressly permitted by the foreign jurisdiction in order for it to be good service. This was because the method of service adopted in that case was not simply not permitted by Turkish law but was a method expressly excluded by reason of the Turkish objection registered under the Hague Convention on the Service Abroad of Judicial and Extrajudicial Documents in Civil or Commercial Matters 1965 (concluded) 1969 (into force) and could not therefore be within the scope of CPR r 6.24. Service of the claim form on officials in Sudan had therefore been effective service for the purpose of the proceedings in the English court.

Appearances: James M Turner (Lane & Partners LLP) for the claimant; the defendant did not appear and was not represented.

Reported by: Jessica Giles, solicitor