1 Legal Status (Personality), 1.4 Arab Monetary Fund v Hashim and others, 21 February 1991, United Kingdom House of Lords, 85 ILR 1

Subject(s):

International organizations, practice and procedure — Responsibility of international organizations — Dualism — Conflict of laws

This article examines the question of what is the legal basis for granting foreign international organizations legal personality under the law of a state which is neither a party to the founding instrument nor the host state. In the considered case the House of Lords was faced with the task of deciding on the legal personality status of the Arab Monetary Fund (AMF) after the organization instituted fraud proceedings against a former Director General in the United Kingdom. As the founding treaty of the AMF had not been incorporated into UK law, the organization was not recognized under domestic law. The House of Lords took recourse to the federal decree of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) which had granted the AMF domestic legal personality.