THE HAGUE: A Dutch court of appeal dismissed on Tuesday a bid by eight descendants of a former sultanate to enforce a $15-billion arbitration award against the Malaysian Government, which hailed the decision as a “landmark victory”.
Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim said the Government was confident it was “closer than ever to completely nullifying” the award after the decision.
“Malaysia trusts that today’s decision ... will put an end to the frivolous attempts of the claimants to enforce the purported final award in other jurisdictions,” Anwar said.
“Won, Alhamdullillah. A bad episode which challenged Malaysia’s sovereignty has been brought to an end. We are thankful that they have failed,“ he told the Malaysian media.
Thus far, Anwar said the Government of Malaysia has stopped at nothing in order to protect its sovereignty, national security and national interests, and the Sulu case has demonstrated a grave violation of Malaysia’s sovereign immunity which matters to every citizen of Malaysia Madani.
Last year, a Paris arbitration court awarded $14.9 billion to the so-called Filipino heirs of the last sultan of Sulu, in a long-running dispute with Malaysia over a colonial-era land deal.
They have since sought to seize Malaysian Government assets in France, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, in a bid to enforce the award.
Malaysia, which did not participate in the arbitration, says the process is illegal. It secured a stay on the award in France but the ruling remains enforceable overseas under a U.N. treaty on arbitration.
In September, the “heirs” sought permission from a Dutch court to enforce the award in the Netherlands.
However, Dutch judges sided with Malaysia, saying the original pact lacked a clause binding parties to arbitration and the French stay meant the claim was not enforceable in the Netherlands, the court said on its website on Tuesday.
“The court dismisses the requests of the Filipino nationals” to demand to execute the arbitration award, the judgment added.
Lawyers for the claimants did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The dispute stems from an 1878 deal between European colonists and the Sultan of Sulu for use of his territory, which spanned parts of the southern Philippines and present-day Malaysia on the island of Borneo.
Independent Malaysia paid a token sum annually to the sultan’s heirs to honour the agreement but stopped in 2013, after supporters of the former sultanate launched a bloody incursion to reclaim land from Malaysia.
The heirs say they were not involved in the incursion and sought arbitration over the suspension of payments.
This month, a Paris court upheld the Malaysian government’s challenge against enforcing a partial award to the heirs.
Malaysia said the decision implied the final arbitration award would be annulled.
