English High Court Grants Anti-Enforcement Injunction to Restrain Enforcement of Exorbitant Russian Judgments

7 February 2025

The decision is the latest in a series in which parties have obtained relief from the English Courts to restrain Russian entities from breaching forum-selection clauses and recovering astreinte penalties.

On 22 January 2025, the High Court handed down its judgment in Google LLC & Google Ireland Limited v. NAO Tsargrad Media & others [2025] EWHC 94 (Comm), granting the Google entities a final anti-enforcement injunction (and other ancillary relief) to restrain the enforcement of "exorbitant" Russian judgments abroad.

Factual Background

The underlying Russian claims concerned Google's decision to terminate the provision of Google and YouTube services to Russian entities designated under international sanctions: NAO Tsargrad Media, TV-Novosti, and No Fond Pravoslavnogo Televideniya (a media company disseminating harmful content).

The service contracts contained English jurisdiction or London-seated arbitration clauses.

Between 2020 and 2022, the Russian entities obtained judgments from the Russian courts – pursuant to Article 248.1 of the Arbitrazh Procedural Code – requiring the Google entities to pay unlimited and compounding astreinte penalties until the services are reinstated.

Article 248.1 of the Arbitrazh Procedural Code empowers the Russian Courts to disregard foreign forum-selection agreements and exercise exclusive jurisdiction over disputes arising out of sanctions.

The sums awarded by the Russian courts are unprecedented. In May 2024 the astreinte penalties exceeded £1.85 octillion (1,850,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000) – a sum the High Court noted was "about 20 trillion times greater than the estimated GDP of all the economies in the world". A more recent estimate calculated the astreinte penalties to be £102 nonillion (102,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000).

The Russian entities subsequently took steps to enforce the judgments in Russia (where £51 million of the assets of Google Russia have been seized) and nine other jurisdictions – Algeria, Egypt, Hungary, Kyrgyzstan, Serbia, South Africa, Spain, Turkey and Vietnam – where the proceedings are at an early stage.

In response, the Google entities sought and obtained anti-enforcement injunctive (AEI) relief, with ancillary anti-anti-suit injunctive (AASI) relief, to prevent the Russian judgments from being recognised and enforced beyond Russia.

Decision & Reasoning

The English Court accepted jurisdiction under CPR 6.33(2B)(b) or CPR 62.5(2A), as the relevant contracts contained an English jurisdiction clause or London-seated arbitration clause; and found that the Russian proceedings had been brought in breach of those forum-selection agreements. (The Court noted that jurisdiction also existed under PD6B § 3.1(6)(c) as the relevant contracts were governed by English law.)

As to AEI relief, the judgment contains an extensive review of the relevant authorities. Notably the Court concluded that: (i) despite being granted in rare cases, AEI relief is not subject to a distinct jurisdictional requirement that the case be "exceptional"; (ii) a breach of an exclusive jurisdiction or arbitration agreement can justify the grant of AEI relief; and (iii) delay and comity are not bars to relief, and the weight to be accorded to them, as part of the Court's remedial discretion, will depend on the circumstances as a whole.

Indeed, the Court rejected the Russian defendants' arguments that relief should be refused for reasons of delay. The Google entities had refrained from seeking ASIs to restrain the original Russian proceedings because they believed that doing so would be futile. They had also submitted their application to the English Courts after being served in some of the foreign enforcement proceedings. The Court did not consider either fact to constitute delay. It held that the Google entities had provided "a cogent account" for the timing of their application and had acted promptly once becoming aware that foreign enforcement proceedings were afoot.

The Court also reasoned that the Russian Defendants and Courts had not been prejudiced by the timing of the application and that granting relief would not unduly interfere with the processes of foreign courts because the enforcement proceedings were at an early stage. The Court recognised that anti-enforcement injunctions have the effect of pre-empting the decision of an enforcing court, but stressed that this factor had to be balanced with the Google's entities' entitlement not to be vexed by foreign enforcement proceedings arising from breaches of the parties' forum-selection agreements.

The Court remarked that the astreinte penalties were "extravagant, indeed other-worldly, sums of money of a penal nature". For this, and the reasons outlined above, the Court concluded that it was just and convenient to grant AEI relief pursuant to s.37(1) of the Senior Courts Act. It also granted AASI relief to counteract the risk of the Russian entities obtaining anti-suit injunctions (ASI) from the Russian courts.

Significance

Historically AEI relief has been granted rarely for reasons of comity and party delay. However, the Courts have more recently observed that AEI relief is no longer a "rare beast" due to cases arising out of international sanctions: Barclays Bank Plc v. PJSC Sovcombank [2024] EWHC 1338 (Comm) at [10].

In this context, the Court's decision provides timely guidance on the grounds on which AEI relief will be granted – in particular, that breach of an exclusive forum-selection clause may be sufficient and that the Courts will conduct a fact-sensitive enquiry when balancing comity against the interests and conduct of the applicant.

For parties, particularly those engaged in disputes with Russian entities that may pursue claims under the Arbitrazh Procedural Code, the decision underscores the importance of reflecting strategically on the timing of seeking ASI or AEI relief to restrain the enforcement of Russian judgments in third states.