About this case:

• Citation:
  [2025] IEHC 62
• Judgment:
  External link
• Court:
  High Court
• Judge:
  Mr Justice Garrett Simons

Delivering judgment for the High Court, Mr Justice Garrett Simons highlighted that “the failure of a defendant to flag, at an early stage, an intention to seek to stay proceedings on the grounds of forum non conveniens may be relevant to an assessment of the reasonableness of a plaintiff not issuing a protective writ. This is especially so in cases, such as the present, where the alternative forum contended for by a defendant is not immediately obvious.”
 
Mark Harty SC and Alannah McGurk BL appeared for the plaintiffs, instructed by WP Tweed & Co. Eoin McCullough SC and Hugh McDowell BL appeared for the defendants, instructed by Dentons Ireland LLP.

Background

The plaintiffs alleged defamation as against the defendants in relation to a news story published by CNN in October 2020, which suggested that the Trump administration pressured the US Department of Defence to award a lease of mid-band spectrum to an entity “Rivada”.

The plaintiffs argued that “Rivada” was a reference to a group of companies which included the second named plaintiff, an Irish-registered company, and which was associated with the first named plaintiff, businessman Mr Declan Ganley.

The defendants contended that the statement referred to a US-registered company, Rivada Networks Inc, but accepted that the article was published in Ireland for the purposes of the Defamation Act 2009 as it appeared on inter alia cnn.com.

The defendants brought an application to stay the proceedings on ground of forum non conveniens — that the proceedings should have been brought in Washington DC, USA as the place with a greater connection to the events concerned. 

However, the defendants did accept that the Irish courts had jurisdiction to hear the proceedings under Order 11(1)(f) of the Rules of the Superior Courts where the action was founded on a tort allegedly committed within the jurisdiction.

The High Court

Having heard the parties’ submissions and evidence from experts in foreign law to the effect that the statutory limitation period for bringing a defamation action in Washington DC had expired, Mr Justice Simons highlighted that “the practical effect of the Irish courts granting a stay on these proceedings is that the plaintiffs would be precluded from pursuing a claim for defamation arising out of the statements first published in October 2020”.

The judge stressed that there is “a condition precedent to an order staying domestic proceedings on the grounds of forum non conveniens that there must have been an alternative forum available to the plaintiff” and reasoned that the issue was whether it was sufficient that a foreign forum was available at an earlier stage, even if access to that forum is now “shut out” by the expiry of the limitation period.

Considering that the pragmatic approach of the UK courts to this issue, “to ask whether the plaintiff acted reasonably in failing to issue a protective writ in the foreign forum”, had much to recommend it when compared with the stricter approach whereby a stay could only be granted if a foreign jurisdiction was available at the date of the stay application, Mr Justice Simons was prepared to assume “without definitively deciding the point” that the expiration of a limitation period in the foreign forum was not necessarily fatal to a stay application.

The court noted that in assessing reasonableness, the factors to be considered included the differential between the limitation periods applicable under domestic law and the law of the foreign forum, and the extent to which a putative defendant has identified the foreign forum as being more appropriate in advance of the expiration of the limitation period.

Turning to the parties before the court, Mr Justice Simons found that the plaintiffs acted reasonably in instituting proceedings solely before the Irish courts without issuing a protective writ in Washington DC, where inter alia their claim was confined to publication within Ireland and was brought by an Irish citizen and an Irish-registered company. 

In particular, the judge pointed out that the claim had a strong connection to the Irish State, and had regard to the fact that the defendants did not propose the Washington DC as the appropriate forum prior to filing their motion seeking a stay more than a year following the expiration of the limitation period in Washington DC, and had initially taken the position that the Irish courts did not have jurisdiction to entertain the proceedings.

In this regard, the judge emphasised that “the proceedings had been served upon the defendants at a time well before the limitation period had expired in Washington, DC. Had the defendants asserted then that this was the appropriate forum, there would still have been time to bring proceedings there.”

Conclusion

Accordingly, the High Court refused to stay the Irish proceedings. 

The High Court also refused a separate motion to strike out the proceedings as against the second and third defendants in circumstances where the issues raised were not suitable for disposal in a peremptory manner. 

Declan Ganley and Rivada Networks Ltd v Cable News Network Inc & Ors [2025] IEHC 62