European e-Justice Portal

FINDING COMPETENT COURTS

The search tool below will help you to identify court(s)/authority(ies) competent for a specific European legal instrument. Please note that although every effort has been made to ascertain the accuracy of the results, there may be some exceptional cases concerning the determination of competence that are not necessarily covered.

Article 2 – Requested courts

In France, the regional courts have sole competence for executing requests for the taking of evidence in civil and commercial matters.

The regional court with territorial competence is the court in whose jurisdiction the request for the taking of evidence must be executed.

The competent court and its contact details can be identified with the help of the European Judicial Atlas on the e-justice website.

Click on the below link to view all competent authorities related to this Article.
List of competent authorities

Article 3 – Central body

France has opted for a single body to be competent at national level, namely the Office for EU law, private international law and mutual legal assistance in civil matters (Bureau du droit de l'Union, du droit international privé et de l’entraide civile – BDIP) of the Ministry of Justice:

Address:
Ministère de la Justice
Direction des Affaires Civiles et du Sceau
Bureau du droit de l'Union, du droit international privé et de l'entraide civile (BDIP)
13 Place Vendôme
75042, PARIS Cedex 01

Tel.: 00 33 (0)1 44 77 61 05
Fax: 00 33 (0)1 44 77 61 22
E-mail address: Entraide-civile-internationale@justice.gouv.fr

Article 5 – Languages accepted for completion of the forms

Forms sent to the regional courts and the French central body must be written in or translated into French.

Article 6 – Means accepted for transmission of requests and other communications

Requests can be sent to the French courts and the French central body by post, fax or e-mail.

Article 17 – Central body or competent authority(ies) responsible for decisions on requests for direct taking of evidence

Ministère de la Justice
Direction des Affaires Civiles et du Sceau
Bureau du droit de l'Union, du droit international privé et de l'entraide civile (BDIP)
13 Place Vendôme
75042, PARIS Cedex 01

Tel.: 00 33 (0)1 44 77 61 05
Fax: 00 33 (0)1 44 77 61 22
E-mail address: Entraide-civile-internationale@justice.gouv.fr

Article 21 – Agreements or arrangements to which Member States are parties and which comply with the conditions in Article 21(2)

Article 21(3)(a) : Agreements concluded by France with other Member States, with a view to facilitating the taking of evidence and compatible with the Regulation, which will be maintained:

Only the Convention between France and the United Kingdom of 2 February 1922 to facilitate formalities in proceedings between persons residing in France and in the United Kingdom will be maintained.

This Convention has in fact been extended to Commonwealth countries and the United Kingdom’s overseas territories with which our relations are not covered by Council Regulation (EC) No 1206/2001 of 28 May 2001.

Last update: 01/03/2019

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Taking evidence