Summary
As to the issue of determing the territorial compentece to hear divorce proceedings between Italian citizens living in Italy, the Supreme Court of Cassation is under no obligation to make any reference, pursuant to Art. 267 TFEU, to the European Court of Justice for a preliminary ruling on the intepretation of Art. 8 of Regulation (EC) No 2201/2003 of 27 November 2003 in order to assess, as a consequence, the conformity to EU law of Art. 4 of Law 1 December 1970 No 898 (providing a different rule), as it is obvious from the wording of the regulation that it clearly aims at distributing jurisdiction (in matters of parental responsibility) between member States while, on the contrary, Art. 4 of Law 898/1970, establishing the competence of the court of the place of the defendant’s residence or domicile (in lieu of that of the residence or domicile of the couple’s child), concerns the different issue of distributing territorial competence within the State. For this reason an answer by the European Court of Justice on the correct interpretation Art. 8 of Regulation (EC) No 2201/2003 is completely irrelevant to the decision on the case at issue.