The Dubai International Financial Center (DIFC) now has a fully operational court system following the appointment of Mark Beer as the registrar of the DIFC Courts and Amna Al Owais as deputy registrar. The DIFC Judicial Authority, which is an autonomous body dealing with civil and commercial court cases for DIFC registered companies, has already tried five cases this year and expects numbers to rise now that all elements of the court system are in place.
"We didn't want to be overwhelmed by cases without being ready to fully deal with them," said Sir Anthony Evans, the Chief Justice of DIFC Courts. "State of the art court premises have been complete since 2006, rules of the court are established and modelled after those of the United Kingdom commercial court. We have appointed a panel of eight judges from around the world." Although there haven't been exchange-related disputes brought to court as of yet, there has been a marked popularity for the services of the small claims tribunal, which deals with claims of less than Dh100,000 (US$27,000) in value.
Ms Al Owais, aside from her appointment as deputy registrar, is also the registrar of the small claims tribunal. shamdan@thenational.ae