Cour de cassation (France), Première chambre civile

Cour de cassation (France), Première chambre civile

France

24 September 2014

M. X... et Mme Y...

No 13-18.012; ECLI : FR:CCASS:2014:C101056

Supreme / Highest Court

Article 53(2)

Not provided

Code de procédure civile; Code civil

Not provided

A Swiss couple married in Switzerland before relocating to France. On 10 October 2007, the wife left the family home in France to settle with the child in Switzerland, where she had retained professional activities and frequently spent extended periods of time. In 2008, she filed for divorce before a Swiss court, which granted the divorce and awarded residential custody of the child to the mother on 28 May 2010. Meanwhile, on 8 February 2010, the husband initiated divorce proceedings before the family court of Créteil (France), seeking both a divorce judgment and the non-recognition in France of the Swiss decision. In a judgment dated 9 April 2013, the Paris Court of Appeal declared the French divorce proceedings moot and dismissed all of the husband's claims. The husband appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that the 1996 Hague Convention should be applied to refuse recognition of the Swiss judgment in France. The Supreme Court dismissed the appeal. It held that the 1996 Hague Convention applies only to the recognition and enforcement of measures adopted after the Convention has entered into force in both the State of origin and the requested State. As of 28 May 2010 – the date of the Swiss decision – the Convention had not yet entered into force in both Switzerland and France. Accordingly, the Court rejected the husband's argument, which relied entirely on the 1996 Hague Convention to oppose the recognition of the Swiss decision in France.

The Supreme Court refused to apply the 1996 Hague Convention to recognition of a Swiss decision taken before its entry into force in France. It thus reaffirmed the temporal conditions governing the applicability of the Convention, emphasizing that it applies only to measures taken after the Convention has entered into force in both the State of origin and the requested State.