Summary
Pursuant to Article 154 of Presidential Decree of 5 January 1967 No 18 as replaced by Legislative Decree of 7 April 2000 No 103 – which applies subject to the “provisions of international and treaty law” – in conjunction with Articles 18, 19 and 60 of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001, Italian courts have jurisdiction over an action brought against the Ministry of Foreign Affairs by one of the Ministry’s employees as regards his financial treatment for the tasks he performed abroad. In fact, pursuant to Article 21 of said Regulation, the clause in the relevant contract that derogates from the jurisdiction of Italian courts, which has been entered into before the arising of the dispute, is unenforceable. As concerns jurisdiction, judgments may become res judicata and acquire preclusive effect – thus, unfolding their effects also beyond the proceedings in which they were rendered – only if a decision on jurisdiction is accompanied by a consequent decision on the merits. The system of transfer of the trial (“translatio iudicii”) provided at Article 59 of Law of 18 June 2009 No 69 implies that the decision in which the court declines jurisdiction affects the subsequent action, and that accordingly the second court is bound by the decision rendered by the first court and may not decline its jurisdiction but, rather, must submit the issue of jurisdiction to the Supreme Court of Cassation. Said system applies only if one of the two national courts has jurisdiction and therefore operates only on internal issues pertaining to national jurisdiction. Accordingly, it does not operate in cases where jurisdiction pertains to a foreign court.