The Supreme People's Court issues a new judicial interpretation on antitrust civil litigation
2024-06-25
On June 24th, it coincided with the second anniversary of the amendment of the Anti Monopoly Law of the People's Republic of China. On the morning of June 25th, the Supreme People's Court held a press conference and released the "Interpretation of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Monopoly Civil Dispute Cases" (hereinafter referred to as the "New Judicial Interpretation"), which will come into effect on July 1, 2024. Tao Kaiyuan, Vice President of the Supreme People's Court, He Zhonglin, Vice President of the Intellectual Property Court of the Supreme People's Court, Zhu Li, Vice President of the Intellectual Property Court, and Yu Xiaohan, Senior Judge of the Intellectual Property Court, attended the press conference and introduced relevant information. The press conference was hosted by Lin Wenwen, spokesperson for the Supreme People's Court. "The" Provisions of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Civil Disputes Caused by Monopoly Behavior "released in 2012 mainly stipulates the basic framework of the litigation system for monopoly civil cases, but there is no interpretation or regulation on the judicial application of substantive provisions of the anti-monopoly law, which is difficult to meet the needs of trial practice." At the press conference, Tao Kaiyuan introduced the background of the development of the new judicial interpretation. It is reported that the new judicial interpretation, based on the absorption and merger of all provisions of the "Provisions of the Supreme People's Court on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Law in the Trial of Civil Disputes Caused by Monopoly Behavior" promulgated in May 2012, has made systematic provisions on relevant issues of anti-monopoly civil litigation in accordance with the revised anti-monopoly law in 2022. The new judicial interpretation consists of 51 articles, divided into six parts. Among them, 9 articles basically follow the provisions of the 2012 judicial interpretation, while 5 articles have been substantially revised or supplemented, and the order has been adjusted accordingly according to the system logic of the new judicial interpretation; Add 37 new articles, mainly related to substantive provisions of anti-monopoly law, especially the interpretation and application of modified provisions. How to effectively implement the requirements of Article 11 of the Anti Monopoly Law revised in 2022 regarding "improving the linkage mechanism between administrative law enforcement and judiciary"? He Zhonglin stated that Article 2, Article 10, Article 13, Article 49 and other provisions of the new judicial interpretation have made specific provisions, covering three aspects: procedural connection, factual determination, and legal application. For issues not covered by the new judicial interpretation, if there are provisions in departmental rules or anti-monopoly guidelines issued by administrative law enforcement agencies, the people's courts can refer to or refer to them based on specific cases in judicial practice, in order to promote more practical, efficient, and orderly operation of the connection between administrative law enforcement and the judiciary. "Striving to solve the problem of 'difficulty in providing evidence and proving' in antitrust civil litigation is one of the focuses of drafting a new judicial interpretation." Zhu Li emphasized that the new judicial interpretation strengthens the connection between anti-monopoly administrative enforcement and monopoly civil litigation, clarifying the high evidential value of anti-monopoly administrative processing decisions; Clarify the rules and standards for allocating the burden of proof, and increase the intensity of transferring the burden of proof; Summarizing domestic and foreign experiences, strengthening competitive effectiveness and direct proof of market dominance; Advocating the use of economic analysis and expert opinions to assist in identifying case facts at multiple levels, striving to reduce the burden of proof and difficulty for plaintiffs, effectively protecting the interests of victims, and strengthening judicial regulation of monopolistic behavior. In recent years, with the development of information technology and digital economy, there have been new changes in the ways and characteristics of monopolistic behavior, posing new challenges to antitrust law enforcement and justice. According to He Zhonglin, the new judicial interpretation summarizes and proposes targeted and scientific judgment rules from the aspects of market definition, regulatory monopoly agreements, and regulation of abuse of market dominance, actively responding to the hot and difficult issues of anti-monopoly in the fields of information technology and digital economy. In practice, it is generally believed that horizontal monopoly agreements are the most harmful monopolistic behavior and the most covert monopolistic behavior. It is difficult to prove and recognize such agreements in antitrust law enforcement and judicial practice. How does the new judicial interpretation address this thorny issue? In this regard, Yu Xiaohan pointed out that Article 18 of the new judicial interpretation specifically stipulates the four factors to be considered for "other collaborative behaviors" and the allocation rules for the burden of proof, in order to better regulate "other collaborative behaviors" with strong concealment. At the same time, Article 18, Paragraph 3 of the new judicial interpretation also specifies the content and scope of reasonable interpretation, with the aim of avoiding improper interference with the operational autonomy of operators. When regulating collaborative behavior, it is necessary to exclude the regulation of "parallel behavior" such as simple market following behavior. In order to fully leverage the guiding role of typical cases, correctly apply the revised anti-monopoly law and accurately understand the new judicial interpretations, and maintain fair competition in the market, the Supreme People's Court also released five recently concluded anti-monopoly typical cases at this press conference. (Lai Xin She)
Edit：Wangchen Responsible editor：Chenjie
Source：http://rmfyb.chinacourt.org
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