Date: Tue, 24 Oct 2006 09:44:37 +1000

From: Neil Foster

Subject: Mbasogo

Dear Charles (et al)

Thanks for this - a fascinating case (especially when taken with the Privy Council decision.) Who would have thought Wilkinson v Downton was relevant (at least potentially) to African revolutions? By the way, I have just finished reading John Le Carré's new book (new at least in Australia) The Mission Song and I now see where he got his ideas from!

Regards
Neil F

Neil Foster
Lecturer & LLB Program Convenor
School of Law
Faculty of Business & Law
University of Newcastle
Callaghan NSW 2308
AUSTRALIA
ph 02 4921 7430
fax 02 4921 6931

>>> Charles Mitchell 23/10/06 9:47 >>>

Members of the group may have been following the ongoing litigation in the English courts arising out of the attempted coup in Equatorial Guinea which came to a premature end in 2004 when a group of mercenaries funded by Sir Mark Thatcher among others were arrested in Zimbabwe. The latest chapter in the saga is Mbasogo, President of the State of Equatorial Guinea v Logo Ltd [2006] EWCA Civ 1370, where the CA has held that the tort claims made by the state of Equatorial Guinea were not justiciable in the English courts, essentially because they amounted to a claim for losses sustained in the exercise of the power of a sovereign state to protect itself from revolution. Following Wong v Parkside the CA also declined to hold that President Mbasogo had any cause of action in respect of emotional distress suffered as a result of the defendants' intentional actions - the fact that their actions were unlawful (unlike those in Wong) was insufficient reason to distinguish the case and give him a claim.

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