EUPillar ITF20150127 Tribunal of Roma (BIIa, BI, Maint., HP)

Summary

Pursuanto to Art. 3 of Regulation (EC) No 2201/2003 of 27 November 2003, Italian courts do have jurisdiction over the claim concerning the personal status of the spouses in the proceedings for legal separation, parental responsibility and maintenance obligations pending between two Peruvian citizens, as the wife-claimant resides in Italy and the regulation shall also apply, according to the decision of the European Court of Justice in Sundelind Lopez (case C-68/07), to nationals of non-member States whose links with the territory of a member State are sufficiently close, in keeping with the grounds of jurisdiction laid down in the regulation which are based on the rule that there must be a real link between the party concerned and the member State exercising jurisdiction. With regard to the same proceedings, Italian courts have jurisdiction, under Art. 8 of Regulation (EC) No 2201/2003, to hear the claim concerning parental responsibility over the child of the couple, as both the mother-claimant and the child reside in Italy. Moreover, under Art. 5(2) of Regulation (EC) No 44/2001 of 22 December 2000, applicable ratione temporis to the case at issue, Italian courts have jurisdiction over the claim concernig maintenance obligations of the father-defendant towards the child, Italy being both the place where the maintenance creditor is domiciled/habitually resident and the place of the court competent to entertain proceedings concerning the status of a person (i.e. the spouses), which maintenance matters are ancillary to. At last, Italian courts have jurisdiction, under Regulation (EC) No 4/2009 of 18 December 2008, also over the claim for maintenance obligations of the husband-defendant towards the wife-claimant. As to the proceedings for legal separation between Peruvian spouses, parental responsibility over their child and maintenance obligations, pursuant to Art. 8 of Regulation (EC) No 1259/2010 of 20 December 2010 (applicable ratione temporis to the case at issue), Italian law governs legal separation, since the spouses lived their matrimonial life in Italy where the wife still resides. With regard to the same proceedings, pursuant to Art. 42 of Law No 218/1995, which refers «in any case» to the 1961 Hague convention concerning the powers of authorities and the law applicable in respect of the protection of infants, and pursuant to Arts. 1 and 2 of the mentioned 1961 Hague convention (which are applicable in any case, irrespective of the ratification of the treaty by the country of the parties’ citizenship), Italian law governs parental responsiblity over the child of the couple as well, Italy being the place where he is habitually resident. At last, under Regulation (EC) No 4/2009, Italian law applies also, by virtue of the 2007 Hague Protocol, to maintenance obligations between spouses.