The High Court said it would allow Joint Stock Company Togliattiazot to discontinue its defamation proceedings against Eurotoaz Limited, subject to undertakings on costs and any future Irish claim arising from the same cause of action.
In a judgment delivered on 3 May 2019, Mr Justice Noonan said the plaintiff must undertake not to enforce costs orders it had already obtained against the defendant and not to institute further proceedings against it in Ireland arising from the same cause of action. The court also said the plaintiff should pay the defendant’s costs of the proceedings. The judgment states that leave would be granted on those conditions; it does not record that the undertakings were subsequently given or set out a final perfected order.
The Irish case began in July 2010. It concerned two letters the defendant had sent in October 2009 to three administrative entities in Russia. The letters claimed the defendant was entitled to shares in the plaintiff and alleged that its claim had been rejected fraudulently and unlawfully. The plaintiff sought, among other relief, damages for defamation over publication of the letters in Russia. Those allegations were not determined in this application.
The parties were also involved in Russian proceedings over the claimed shares. The judgment recounts a series of decisions in Russia and says the parties agreed that a Russian Supreme Court decision of 2 March 2016 meant the defendant had no current entitlement to be registered as owner of the shares. They disputed the meaning and effect of other Russian rulings. The judge did not resolve that dispute on the discontinuance application.
The defendant opposed discontinuance and argued it was entitled to have the allegations determined at trial. It also alleged that the Irish proceedings had been brought to stifle or retaliate for its Russian case. The judge said the defendant had not shown that discontinuance would cause injustice. He held that a defendant has no general right to insist on a trial simply to disprove allegations in pleadings, and that the court should not examine the underlying merits when deciding an application to discontinue.
The judge rejected the plaintiff’s solicitor’s hearsay evidence about the plaintiff’s reasons for ending the case, finding no adequate reason had been given for relying on it. But he said that did not decide the application: the plaintiff was not required to provide a reason for discontinuing. The judgment records that the defendant’s earlier appeal concerning trial by judge alone had been struck out with costs to the plaintiff in November 2018.