【Case Study】

Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 (MH370) was a scheduled international passenger flight that disappeared on 8 March 2014,while flying from Kuala Lumpur International Airport near Kuala Lumpur,Malaysia,to Beijing Capital International Airport in Beijing,China.227 passengers and 12 crew members disappeared since then.All 12 crew members were Malaysian citizens.Of the 227 passengers,152 were Chinese citizens; 38 passengers were Malaysian.The remaining passengers were from 13 different countries.

On 29 January 2015,the Director General of the Department of Civil Aviation Malaysia announced that the status of Flight 370 would be changed to an “accident”,in accordance with the Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation,and that all passengers and crew are presumed to have lost their lives.

Where should the aircrash victim’s relatives sue for damages? What law governs their claims? If the relatives of a Chinese victim seek to obtain a declaration of death in absentia by a People’s Court in Beijing where he/she habitually resided before the aircrash,what law should govern the issue? If the relatives of the victims of different nationalities sue for damages before a Chinese court,should they be governed by different laws? If a People’s Court in Beijing rendered a judgment against the Malaysia Airlines,should the judgment be recognized and enforced in Malaysia?

This case provides the issues with which private international law has to cope.The legal issues it poses are difficult because law has become the prerogative of territorial sovereigns,whereas human affairs freely cross state and national boundaries.As this case illustrates,the tension between sovereignty and mobility raises a series of questions which can be grouped together under the following three headings:(https://www.daowen.com)

(1) Jurisdiction (where can the parties resolve a dispute by suit or other means,such as arbitration or reconciliation?)

(2) Choice of law (what law will a judge or an arbitrator apply to resolve the dispute?)

(3) Recognition and enforcement of judgments or awards (what will be the effect of any judgment or award? Or to be more specific,can other jurisdictions and nations be expected to honor the determinations of the court or the arbitrators that decided the dispute?)

Basically,the above three questions consist of the main topics of private international law.Consequently,the subject matter of this course is central to planning international transactions and to resolving disputes resulting from those transactions.