JURIDICON Attorney Comments on Bank Deposit Contracts and Force Majeure in the Case of War

JURIDICON Law Firm attorney Laimonas Marcinkevičius gave his comments on bank deposit contracts and   force majeure circumstances in the case of war in Lithuanian newspaper “Verslo žinios” article “Foreign Bank Accounts Help in the Case of Military Conflict” (“Karinio konflikto atveju gelbsti sąskaitosužsienyje”).

Laimonas Marcinkevičius says that banks have no right to refuse to give back money for clients from their bank deposit’ accounts in the case of military conflict. “Imagine that natural or legal person took credit from a bank and bought, for example, object of real estate. Then, in the case of military conflict, this person decides to not pay regular payments and not repay the whole credit. This would be lawful? Of course, not”- explains Mr. Marcinkevičius. According to attorney, military conflict could be recognized as force majeure only temporarily. Both parties of the contract should still fulfill its obligations later.

Attorney recommends to write the detailed description of force majeure in your bank deposit contract and provide alternative manners of contract’s execution in it. “The other way to decrease the risk is to choose the bank which has just branch in Lithuania and the main location of this bank is in country where is no threat of military conflict”- suggests Mr. Marcinkevičius. If you want to decrease risk for even more, you should choose few banks registered in foreign countries.

It should be noted that in the case law of European Union were just few cases related to force majeure. Usually European Court of Justice recognizes the war as force majeure. The Supreme Court of Lithuania examined just one similar case[1]. In this case the war and nationalization were recognized as force majeure.

You can read the whole article in Lithuanian language in newspaper “Verslo žinios” (2015 1^st of July, No. 97 (4370), p. 15). You can also find this article in Lithuanian on the internet.[2]