On January 28, 2026, H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke dismissed an urgent application for an injunction brought by seven claimants against five respondents. The dispute, centered on a contested election in onshore Dubai, sought to restrain the implementation of results pending an arbitration seated in Milan. Justice Cooke’s ruling, delivered at 10:00 am, underscored that the DIFC Court’s power to grant interim measures is not a roving commission, but is tethered strictly to the territoriality of the relief sought.
For cross-border litigators and arbitration counsel, this decision serves as a sobering reminder that the DIFC Court’s supportive jurisdiction under Article 15.4 of the New Court Law is not a panacea for disputes lacking a clear nexus to the Centre. By rejecting the attempt to use the DIFC as a forum for restraining onshore conduct that would not be enforceable within the DIFC, the Court has reinforced the principle that interim relief must be functional—it must serve an enforcement process that the DIFC is actually empowered to oversee.
How Did the Dispute Between Oleksei and Olorun Arise?
The genesis of Oleksei v Olorun lies in a bitter corporate governance struggle situated entirely outside the jurisdictional boundaries of the Dubai International Financial Centre. On 19 December 2025, a contested election was held to determine the Board and President of the First Respondent, an entity governed by onshore UAE company law. Seven applicants—Oleksei, Olesja, Oliff, Olexi, Olinijia, Olimipiana, and Olley—sought to challenge the validity of these results against five respondents. Rather than pursuing their primary remedies through the onshore Dubai courts, the applicants engineered a complex, multi-jurisdictional litigation strategy. They initiated arbitral proceedings seated in Italy before the Milan Chamber of Arbitration on 16 January 2026. Yet, three days prior to formally commencing that arbitration, they filed an urgent application for interim injunctive relief in the DIFC Courts.
This sequence of events exposes a calculated attempt at forum-shopping. The applicants sought to leverage the DIFC Courts' robust common law injunction powers to freeze the corporate governance apparatus of an onshore entity, pending the outcome of a foreign-seated arbitration where no tribunal had yet been constituted. Specifically, they demanded an order restraining the respondents from validating or implementing the election results, alongside a mandate for the preservation of all Electoral Records and related legal opinions. The strategy was clear: bypass the onshore courts, which might take a more restrictive view of interlocutory interference in corporate elections, and seek a swift, draconian order from an offshore common law judge.
To anchor this ambitious request, the applicants relied on the newly enacted Dubai Law No. 2 of 2025 (the "New Court Law") and the DIFC Arbitration Law No. 1 of 2008. The jurisdictional hook was ostensibly Article 15.4 of the New Court Law, which governs the court's power to issue precautionary measures.
Article 15 of the New Court Law, under the heading “Interim and Precautionary Measures” provides that “the DIFC Courts have jurisdiction to hear and determine applications for interim or precautionary measures relating to ………..
The ellipsis in the statutory text points to the critical limitation that the applicants attempted to bypass: the requirement for a territorial or enforcement nexus. The applicants' strategy relied on conflating the DIFC Court's well-established jurisdiction to grant freezing orders in support of foreign proceedings with the power to grant substantive interlocutory injunctions governing onshore conduct. They argued that because a future Milan arbitral award might theoretically be recognized in the DIFC, the court possessed the ancillary power to police the underlying dispute in the interim.
H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke systematically dismantled this proposition. The fundamental flaw in the applicants' case was the complete absence of any connecting factor to the financial free zone. The corporate entity was onshore, the elections were onshore, and the intended substantive litigation—referenced as an Intended Onshore Claim against the Second and Third Respondents pursuant to Article 84 of Federal Decree-Law No. 32 of 2021—was firmly rooted in the jurisdiction of the Dubai Courts.
It is clear on the face of the Claim Form, the Application and the Affidavits sworn in support that it is not said that any documents to be preserved are within the DIFC nor that any action to be restrained would, if not restrained, take place within the DIFC.
By seeking to restrain the implementation of election results held in onshore Dubai, the applicants were asking the DIFC Court to act as a surrogate regulator for onshore corporate disputes. This represents a dangerous mutation of the conduit jurisdiction principles established in cases like ARB-003-2013: Banyan Tree Corporate PTE Ltd v Meydan Group LLC [2013] DIFC ARB 003. While Banyan Tree confirmed the DIFC Courts' role as a conduit for the enforcement of arbitral awards against onshore assets, it did not authorize the court to issue roving injunctions to manage the internal affairs of onshore companies pending foreign arbitrations. The conduit jurisdiction is a mechanism for debt recovery and award execution, not a blank check for extraterritorial corporate governance intervention.
The applicants attempted to bridge this doctrinal gap by invoking the enforcement principles articulated in the Privy Council decision of Broad Idea International Ltd v Convoy Collateral Ltd. They suggested that the DIFC Court's jurisdiction to support foreign proceedings extended to granting the requested relief to prevent the ultimate arbitral award from being rendered nugatory. Justice Cooke rejected this analogy, drawing a sharp distinction between asset-preservation orders and substantive interlocutory injunctions.
As stated above, the enforcement principle as enunciated in Broad Idea (ibid) and the DIFC cases which drew on that decision for support, does not assist the Applicants. Unlike in the situation where freezing orders have been granted and enforcement in the DIFC of a foreign Court money judgement (or arbitral award to the same effect) could be foreseen, the orders sought in the Milan arbitration would not give rise to any potential for enforcement in the DIFC.
The distinction is paramount for practitioners navigating cross-border disputes in the UAE. A freezing order (Mareva injunction) is designed to prevent the dissipation of assets, ensuring that a future money judgment or arbitral award can be satisfied. In such cases, if there is a prospect that the resulting award will be brought to the DIFC for execution against local assets, the DIFC Court may intervene to preserve the status quo. However, the relief sought by Oleksei and the other applicants was entirely different in character. They were not seeking to freeze bank accounts; they were seeking to dictate who controlled the First Respondent's board.
If the Milan tribunal eventually ruled in favor of the applicants, declaring the 19 December 2025 elections invalid, that declaratory or injunctive award would need to be enforced against the company onshore. The DIFC Court would have no role in executing an order compelling an onshore company to reconstitute its board or alter its onshore commercial registry details. Therefore, the failure to grant an interim injunction in the DIFC would not thwart the court's future enforcement jurisdiction, because the court would never possess enforcement jurisdiction over the specific non-monetary relief requested.
Transported into the case of an interlocutory injunction of the kind sought here, the question is whether execution of a judgement in the DIFC would be thwarted without such relief to which the answer is no because no such judgement in the terms of the putative award could be executed in the DIFC in any event. 17.
The procedural history of the hearing further illustrates the speculative nature of the application. The matter came before Justice Cooke on 26 January 2026. Of the five respondents, only the First and Fourth Respondents acknowledged service and appeared through counsel. The First Respondent initially adopted a neutral position in a skeleton argument filed prior to the hearing. However, upon appearing, the First Respondent pivoted, actively opposing the injunction and endorsing the Fourth Respondent's primary submission: that the DIFC Court fundamentally lacked jurisdiction to grant the orders sought. The First Respondent even advanced arguments regarding the American Cyanamid tests for interlocutory injunctions, though the court ultimately did not need to weigh the balance of convenience given the absolute lack of jurisdiction. The Fourth Respondent also heavily criticized the applicants for joining her to the proceedings, highlighting the scattergun approach of the litigation strategy.
The applicants' reliance on the DIFC Arbitration Law was equally unavailing. They cited Article 24.3, which deals with the court's power to issue interim measures in relation to arbitration proceedings. However, as Justice Cooke noted, the applicants ultimately placed no real weight on this provision during oral submissions, and the court found that it added nothing to the jurisdictional debate under the New Court Law. The core issue remained the territorial disconnect between the relief sought and the DIFC's statutory remit.
This ruling serves as a vital corrective against the misuse of the DIFC Courts as a tactical weapon in onshore corporate battles. The strategy deployed by the applicants—commencing a foreign arbitration and simultaneously seeking an offshore injunction to paralyze an onshore entity—is a high-risk maneuver that relies on blurring the lines between supportive jurisdiction and substantive interference. Similar boundary-testing was observed in DEC-001-2025 DEC 001/2025 Techteryx Ltd v (1) Aria Commodities , where the court had to carefully delineate the scope of its intervention in complex, multi-forum disputes.
By dismissing the application and the First Respondent’s Postponement Application, Justice Cooke reinforced the principle that the DIFC Court's interim jurisdiction is strictly tethered to its enforcement capabilities and territorial boundaries. The court will not allow its procedural arsenal to be co-opted by litigants seeking to bypass the proper onshore forums for resolving onshore corporate governance disputes. The dismissal of the injunction applications on 28 January 2026 sends a clear message to practitioners: forum-shopping for interim relief requires a genuine jurisdictional anchor, not merely a theoretical possibility of future, unrelated enforcement.
How Did the Case Move From the Initial Injunction Application to the Final Costs Hearing?
The procedural history of Oleksei v Olorun provides a masterclass in the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Court’s efficiency when confronted with meritless jurisdictional overreach. The timeline from the initial filing to the final costs assessment reveals a judiciary that refuses to entertain speculative applications lacking a firm territorial or enforcement nexus, while simultaneously policing the costs generated by such satellite litigation. The lifecycle of this dispute—spanning just over a month—illustrates the rigorous filtering mechanisms applied to foreign-seated arbitrations seeking local interim relief.
The litigation commenced on January 13, 2026, when seven claimants—Oleksei, Olesja, Oliff, Olexi, Olinijia, Olimipiana, and Olley—filed an application seeking urgent interim injunctive relief against five respondents. The underlying dispute was fundamentally disconnected from the DIFC. It concerned contested elections held on December 19, 2025, for the Board and President of the First Respondent, an entity operating in onshore Dubai. The claimants sought to restrain the respondents from validating or implementing the election results, and demanded the preservation of electoral records and legal opinions, pending the constitution of an arbitral tribunal in Milan.
To anchor this sweeping request in the DIFC, the claimants relied on Article 15.4 of Dubai Law No. 2 of 2025 (the New Court Law) and Article 24.3 of the DIFC Arbitration Law No. 1 of 2008. The statutory framework for such applications is explicitly defined:
Article 15 of the New Court Law, under the heading “Interim and Precautionary Measures” provides that “the DIFC Courts have jurisdiction to hear and determine applications for interim or precautionary measures relating to ………..
Despite this provision, the claimants faced an insurmountable hurdle: the complete absence of any connecting factor to the DIFC. The hearing held before H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke on 26 January 2026 exposed the fragility of the application. Only the First and Fourth Respondents appeared, represented by counsel. The procedural posture of the First Respondent was particularly notable. Prior to the hearing, the First Respondent had filed a brief, three-page skeleton argument adopting an ostensibly neutral stance regarding the injunction. However, during the oral submissions, the First Respondent executed a tactical pivot, aligning with the Fourth Respondent to aggressively contest the court’s jurisdiction and challenge the utility of the orders sought under the American Cyanamid principles.
H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke delivered his substantive ruling with remarkable speed, issuing the order at 10:00 am on January 28, 2026. The judgment dismantled the claimants' jurisdictional theory. The court found that the requested measures were entirely extraterritorial in nature, failing to satisfy the fundamental requirement that the precautionary acts must occur within the DIFC's geographic or legal boundaries. The court's reasoning was unequivocal regarding the lack of local nexus:
It is clear on the face of the Claim Form, the Application and the Affidavits sworn in support that it is not said that any documents to be preserved are within the DIFC nor that any action to be restrained would, if not restrained, take place within the DIFC.
Consequently, the court ordered that The Applicants’ Injunction Application is dismissed. The dismissal was not merely a rejection of the specific relief sought, but a broader statement on the limits of the DIFC Court's supportive jurisdiction. The claimants had attempted to invoke the enforcement principle—often utilized in freezing order applications where a future foreign judgment or award might be executed against assets within the DIFC. However, H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke distinguished the present scenario from those involving monetary preservation, noting that the specific performance and declaratory relief sought in the Milan arbitration could never translate into an enforceable judgment within the DIFC.
As stated above, the enforcement principle as enunciated in Broad Idea (ibid) and the DIFC cases which drew on that decision for support, does not assist the Applicants. Unlike in the situation where freezing orders have been granted and enforcement in the DIFC of a foreign Court money judgement (or arbitral award to the same effect) could be foreseen, the orders sought in the Milan arbitration would not give rise to any potential for enforcement in the DIFC.
This strict adherence to the limits of enforcement jurisdiction echoes the court's approach in other complex cross-border disputes, such as ARB-005-2025: ARB 005/2025 Nashrah v (1) Najem (2) Nex, where the boundaries of supportive intervention were similarly tested. The DIFC Court consistently refuses to act as a global clearinghouse for interim relief when the ultimate substantive award holds no prospect of local execution.
Following the substantive dismissal on January 28, the court directed that Costs are reserved for future decision, initiating a rapid sequence of written submissions. The First and Fourth Respondents were granted three working days to file their costs claims, limited to four pages each. The claimants were afforded a subsequent three days to respond, followed by a two-day window for final replies. This tightly controlled briefing schedule ensured that the satellite litigation over costs did not languish.
The final costs order, issued at 8:00 am on February 24, 2026, further demonstrates the court's rigorous oversight. While the respondents were the clear victors and prima facie entitled to their reasonable costs, H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke did not simply rubber-stamp their demands. The court conducted a summary assessment that aggressively trimmed excessive claims, ensuring that the penalty imposed on the claimants for their meritless application remained proportionate.
The First Respondent sought AED 85,500 in solicitors' costs, which the court reduced to AED 60,000, citing the "limited scope of what was done." More significantly, the First Respondent attempted to recover substantial fees for foreign legal assistance. The court firmly rejected this attempt to bypass local registration requirements:
(c) AED 90,000 is claimed in respect of an Italian lawyer’s fees who is not registered under Part 1 and are disallowed in total as not incurred reasonably in connection with the claim.
The Fourth Respondent faced similar scrutiny. While her counsel's fees of AED 37,177.82 were allowed in full, the court found the remainder of her AED 116,655 claim to be disproportionate. The judge exercised his discretion to reduce the sums claimed to AED 50,000 in all, inclusive of VAT. Ultimately, the claimants were ordered to pay AED 92,000 to the First Respondent and AED 87,177.82 to the Fourth Respondent within 28 days.
The procedural trajectory from January 13 to February 24 encapsulates the DIFC Court's operational philosophy regarding foreign-seated arbitrations. By swiftly identifying the jurisdictional void and subsequently enforcing a disciplined costs regime, the court protects its docket from speculative forum shopping. This efficiency is not an isolated occurrence but part of a broader institutional capability to manage complex procedural boundaries, a trait similarly observed in recent jurisdictional battles like DEC-001-2025 DEC 001/2025 Techteryx Ltd v (1) Aria Commodities . The Oleksei timeline serves as a stark warning to practitioners: applications for interim measures lacking a genuine territorial or enforcement nexus will be disposed of with ruthless efficiency, and the resulting costs will be strictly apportioned.
What Is the Jurisdictional Test Under Article 15.4 of the New Court Law?
The jurisdictional threshold for obtaining interim relief in the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Courts in support of foreign-seated arbitrations has been sharply defined by H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke in Oleksei v Olorun. The applicants approached the court seeking urgent interim injunctive relief to halt the implementation of contested election results for a corporate board situated in onshore Dubai. Their underlying substantive dispute was bound for an arbitration seated in Milan, Italy. To bridge the geographical and jurisdictional gap between the onshore Dubai election and the Italian arbitral seat, the applicants relied heavily on the newly enacted Article 15.4 of Dubai Law No. 2 of 2025 (the New Court Law).
The court’s interpretation of this provision establishes a rigorous, two-pronged analytical framework that fundamentally limits the DIFC’s supportive role. The test demands either a strict territorial nexus—meaning the requested measures must be capable of being executed physically within the DIFC—or an enforceability nexus, requiring that the ultimate arbitral award be capable of recognition and execution within the DIFC. By failing to satisfy either limb, the applicants exposed the outer boundaries of the DIFC Court’s jurisdiction.
The statutory starting point for the court’s analysis is the text of the New Court Law itself. Justice Cooke set out the foundational premise of the jurisdiction:
Article 15 of the New Court Law, under the heading “Interim and Precautionary Measures” provides that “the DIFC Courts have jurisdiction to hear and determine applications for interim or precautionary measures relating to ………..
While the statute grants the DIFC Courts the authority to issue interim measures, that authority is not a blank cheque to police disputes globally. The first limb of the jurisdictional test requires the court to examine the specific nature and location of the acts to be restrained or the assets to be preserved. The applicants sought orders restraining the Respondents from validating the results of the December 19, 2025 elections and mandating the preservation of all Electoral Records.
However, the evidentiary record presented a fatal territorial disconnect. The election took place in onshore Dubai, the corporate entity was an onshore entity, and the records were held outside the financial free zone. Justice Cooke observed the glaring absence of any DIFC nexus in the applicants' own filings:
It is clear on the face of the Claim Form, the Application and the Affidavits sworn in support that it is not said that any documents to be preserved are within the DIFC nor that any action to be restrained would, if not restrained, take place within the DIFC.
This factual finding immediately closed the first jurisdictional gateway. The DIFC Court cannot issue precautionary measures under Article 15.4 if the actions to be restrained or the documents to be preserved are located entirely outside its territorial boundaries. The court’s coercive powers do not extend into onshore Dubai unless a specific statutory mechanism or reciprocal enforcement treaty bridges the gap. The applicants' failure to identify a single document or action within the DIFC rendered the territorial limb of Article 15.4 inapplicable.
Faced with this territorial deficit, the applicants attempted to pivot to the second jurisdictional gateway: the enforceability nexus. They argued that the DIFC Court possessed jurisdiction to grant interim relief in support of the Milan arbitration because the court has a recognized jurisdiction to enforce foreign arbitral awards. To construct this argument, the applicants relied on the enforcement principles articulated by the Privy Council in Broad Idea International Ltd v Convoy Collateral Ltd [2021] UKPC 24, a landmark decision that expanded the power of common law courts to grant freezing injunctions in support of foreign proceedings.
The applicants' reliance on Broad Idea required Justice Cooke to dissect the fundamental difference between a freezing order (a Mareva injunction) and an interlocutory injunction that grants substantive relief. A freezing order is designed to prevent the dissipation of assets so that a future money judgment or arbitral award can be satisfied. In the context of the DIFC, as established in cases like ARB-003-2013: Banyan Tree Corporate PTE Ltd v Meydan Group LLC, the court will grant a freezing order over assets within the DIFC if there is a prospect that a foreign award will eventually be brought to the DIFC for enforcement against those assets.
Justice Cooke systematically dismantled the applicants' attempt to transpose the Broad Idea principle onto their request for substantive injunctive relief. The relief sought in Oleksei v Olorun was not designed to preserve assets for the execution of a future money judgment. Instead, it sought to dictate the governance of an onshore corporation pending the outcome of the Milan arbitration. The court clarified the doctrinal boundary:
As stated above, the enforcement principle as enunciated in Broad Idea (ibid) and the DIFC cases which drew on that decision for support, does not assist the Applicants. Unlike in the situation where freezing orders have been granted and enforcement in the DIFC of a foreign Court money judgement (or arbitral award to the same effect) could be foreseen, the orders sought in the Milan arbitration would not give rise to any potential for enforcement in the DIFC.
This distinction is critical for practitioners navigating the DIFC's supportive jurisdiction. The court’s power to act in aid of foreign proceedings is strictly parasitic upon its ultimate power to enforce the resulting judgment or award. If the prospective award cannot be enforced in the DIFC, the court lacks the jurisdictional anchor to grant interim relief.
In the present dispute, the Milan tribunal was tasked with determining the validity of an election for an onshore Dubai entity. Whatever declaratory or injunctive relief the Milan tribunal might ultimately award, that relief would concern the internal governance of an onshore corporation. Such an award would require enforcement through the onshore Dubai Courts, not the DIFC Courts. The DIFC Court has no mechanism, nor any jurisdictional mandate, to execute an arbitral award dictating the board composition of an onshore entity with no ties to the financial centre.
Justice Cooke drove this point home by adapting the Broad Idea test to the specific facts of the application:
Transported into the case of an interlocutory injunction of the kind sought here, the question is whether execution of a judgement in the DIFC would be thwarted without such relief to which the answer is no because no such judgement in the terms of the putative award could be executed in the DIFC in any event.
The logic is unassailable. The purpose of granting interim relief in support of foreign proceedings is to ensure that the court’s eventual enforcement jurisdiction is not rendered futile. If the court will never possess enforcement jurisdiction over the specific type of award being sought, there is no enforcement jurisdiction to protect. The applicants were asking the DIFC Court to intervene in a dispute where it would have no role at the conclusion of the arbitral process.
The court further emphasized that the absence of enforcement potential entirely negates the utility and jurisdictional basis of the requested injunction:
There is no question of the Court’s jurisdiction to enforce a foreign judgment or award being thwarted absent the grant of the injunction sought because the Court could not enforce the award in the terms sought by the Applicants in the arbitration.
This ruling places a definitive limit on the expansive interpretations of DIFC jurisdiction that have occasionally surfaced in the wake of the Joint Judicial Committee (JJC) conflicts and the evolving relationship between onshore and offshore Dubai courts. While the DIFC Courts have robustly defended their jurisdiction to issue anti-suit injunctions to protect their own seated arbitrations—as seen in ARB-005-2025: ARB 005/2025 Nashrah v (1) Najem (2) Nex—they remain acutely aware of their territorial and functional boundaries when asked to support foreign-seated tribunals.
The decision in Oleksei v Olorun aligns with the broader trajectory of DIFC jurisprudence, which demands a tangible nexus before deploying coercive powers. Similar to the rigorous scrutiny applied to jurisdictional gateways in DEC-001-2025 DEC 001/2025 Techteryx Ltd v (1) Aria Commodities , Justice Cooke’s analysis requires applicants to map a clear path from the interim relief sought today to the final enforcement action tomorrow.
The First Respondent, despite initially taking a neutral stance, ultimately opposed the application at the hearing, raising arguments regarding the American Cyanamid tests for the grant of injunctions. However, the court’s jurisdictional finding under Article 15.4 rendered a deep dive into the balance of convenience or the adequacy of damages unnecessary. The jurisdictional bar is an absolute threshold; without it, the merits of the injunction application cannot be entertained.
By strictly interpreting Article 15.4 of the New Court Law, the DIFC Court has signaled to the international arbitration community that it will not serve as a court of convenience for disputes lacking a genuine connection to the financial centre. The requirement that requested measures must be capable of being taken within the DIFC, or that the potential arbitral award must be enforceable within the DIFC, ensures that the court’s resources and coercive powers are deployed only where they have legitimate legal effect. The absence of such a nexus renders the court powerless, confirming that the DIFC’s supportive role, while powerful, is fundamentally limited by the mechanics of final enforcement.
How Did Justice Cooke Distinguish the Broad Idea Doctrine?
The jurisdictional chasm facing the applicants in Oleksei v Olorun was stark: they sought to leverage the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Courts to freeze the outcome of an onshore Dubai corporate election, pending the constitution of an arbitral tribunal seated in Milan. To bridge this territorial and procedural gap, the applicants deployed a sophisticated, albeit ultimately flawed, legal strategy anchored in the Privy Council’s landmark decision in Broad Idea International Ltd v Convoy Collateral Ltd [2021] UKPC 24. The applicants argued that the DIFC Court possessed a broad, supportive jurisdiction to grant interim relief in aid of foreign proceedings, even in the absence of a substantive local cause of action. H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke’s systematic dismantling of this argument provides a critical clarification of the limits of the DIFC’s injunctive powers, firmly establishing that freezing orders and related precautionary measures are not standalone remedies floating free of territorial constraints, but must be strictly tethered to a legitimate, foreseeable enforcement process within the DIFC.
The applicants’ jurisdictional hook relied on the statutory framework governing the DIFC Courts’ supportive powers. They initiated their claim by stating that The Applicants seek urgent interim injunctive relief under the newly enacted Dubai Law No. 2 of 2025. Specifically, they pointed to the provisions outlining the court's authority over precautionary measures. As Justice Cooke noted, the statutory language is precise:
Article 15 of the New Court Law, under the heading “Interim and Precautionary Measures” provides that “the DIFC Courts have jurisdiction to hear and determine applications for interim or precautionary measures relating to ………..
While the applicants initially cast a wide net, they quickly narrowed their statutory focus. During the proceedings, it became evident that the arbitration-specific supportive powers were not the primary battleground. Justice Cooke recorded that no reliance was placed on Article 24.3 of the Arbitration Law, allowing the court to focus entirely on the general interim measures jurisdiction under the New Court Law and the common law principles imported via the Broad Idea doctrine.
The Broad Idea decision fundamentally reshaped the landscape of cross-border asset preservation by overturning the strictures of The Siskina [1979] AC 210. Lord Leggatt, delivering the majority opinion in the Privy Council, decoupled the power to grant a freezing injunction from the necessity of having a pre-existing substantive cause of action triable in the same forum. Instead, Broad Idea established that a court can grant a freezing order against a party to prevent the dissipation of assets, provided the injunction is in aid of the execution of a prospective judgment—whether domestic or foreign—that the court will eventually have the jurisdiction to recognize and enforce.
The applicants in Oleksei attempted to stretch this "enforcement principle" beyond its breaking point. They were not seeking a traditional Mareva injunction to lock down bank accounts or real estate to satisfy a future monetary award. Instead, their requested relief was entirely prohibitory and specific in nature. They sought orders restraining the Respondents from validating the results of the contested December 19 elections and mandating the preservation of all Electoral Records and legal opinions connected to the onshore entity.
Justice Cooke identified this fundamental mismatch between the remedy sought and the jurisprudential foundation of the Broad Idea doctrine. A freezing order designed to protect the court's future enforcement jurisdiction over assets is categorically distinct from an interlocutory injunction that effectively grants the substantive relief sought in the underlying dispute on a provisional basis. Addressing the applicants' reliance on the Privy Council authority, Justice Cooke held:
The judgment of Lord Legatt in Broad Idea (ibid) does not advance the Applicant’s arguments. In that case, as pointed out at paragraphs 84-85, a freezing injunction is different in character from other interlocutory injunctions which grant, on a temporary and provisional basis the substantive relief claimed by the applicant.
By seeking to halt the implementation of an election, the applicants were asking the DIFC Court to intervene directly in the substantive governance of an onshore Dubai entity. This requires a primary basis of jurisdiction over the dispute or the parties' actions within the territory, which the DIFC Court manifestly lacked. The Broad Idea doctrine is a shield for the integrity of the enforcement process; it is not a sword to bypass territorial limits on substantive judicial intervention.
To drive this point home, Justice Cooke analyzed the mechanics of the "enforcement principle." For a court to grant relief under the Broad Idea framework, there must be a realistic prospect that the foreign proceedings will result in a judgment or award that the local court will be called upon to enforce. In the context of the DIFC, this principle has been tested and refined in cases involving the enforcement of foreign arbitral awards, most notably in the lineage of jurisprudence following ARB-003-2013: Banyan Tree Corporate PTE Ltd v Meydan Group LLC. In Banyan Tree, the DIFC Court confirmed its jurisdiction to recognize and enforce arbitral awards even absent assets in the DIFC, establishing the jurisdiction as a robust conduit for enforcement. However, that conduit requires an enforceable end-product.
In Oleksei, the prospective end-product of the Milan arbitration would be a declaratory or injunctive award concerning the validity of an onshore election. Such an award is not a money judgment. It does not attach to assets within the DIFC. Consequently, the DIFC Court would never be the appropriate forum to execute such an award. Justice Cooke articulated this fatal flaw with precision:
As stated above, the enforcement principle as enunciated in Broad Idea (ibid) and the DIFC cases which drew on that decision for support, does not assist the Applicants. Unlike in the situation where freezing orders have been granted and enforcement in the DIFC of a foreign Court money judgement (or arbitral award to the same effect) could be foreseen, the orders sought in the Milan arbitration would not give rise to any potential for enforcement in the DIFC.
The court further reinforced this by applying the "thwarting" test, a conceptual framework frequently utilized to determine the necessity of interim relief in cross-border contexts. Drawing on prior DIFC authority, Justice Cooke examined whether the absence of the requested injunction would render the DIFC Court's eventual enforcement jurisdiction futile. If a party is likely to dissipate assets, a future judgment is thwarted, justifying a freezing order. But when the underlying relief is declaratory and non-monetary, the concept of thwarting the DIFC's enforcement process becomes logically incoherent.
Transported into the case of an interlocutory injunction of the kind sought here, the question is whether execution of a judgement in the DIFC would be thwarted without such relief to which the answer is no because no such judgement in the terms of the putative award could be executed in the DIFC in any event.
This analysis draws a sharp boundary around the DIFC's supportive jurisdiction, distinguishing the present facts from scenarios where the court has aggressively protected arbitral integrity, such as in ARB-005-2025: Nashrah v Najem. In cases where the DIFC is the seat, or where there is a clear nexus to DIFC assets, the court's power to grant interim measures is expansive. However, when the dispute is entirely foreign—or in this case, entirely onshore Dubai with a foreign arbitral seat—the DIFC Court will not allow its interim measures jurisdiction to be weaponized as a forum of convenience.
The territorial disconnect was absolute. The applicants failed to demonstrate any factual or legal nexus between the relief sought and the geographic or jurisdictional boundaries of the financial centre. The court scrutinized the evidentiary record and found a complete absence of any DIFC connection. Justice Cooke observed:
It is clear on the face of the Claim Form, the Application and the Affidavits sworn in support that it is not said that any documents to be preserved are within the DIFC nor that any action to be restrained would, if not restrained, take place within the DIFC.
By dismissing the application, Justice Cooke cemented a vital doctrinal safeguard: the Broad Idea principle cannot be reverse-engineered to grant substantive interlocutory injunctions in disputes where the DIFC Court has no prospect of exercising enforcement jurisdiction. A freezing order requires a separate head of jurisdiction if it is not in aid of an enforceable judgment. The applicants' attempt to use the DIFC as an offshore injunction forum for an onshore corporate dispute failed because they conflated the preservation of assets with the provisional granting of substantive relief. The ruling ensures that while the DIFC remains a highly supportive jurisdiction for international arbitration, its powers under Article 15 of the New Court Law are strictly governed by the practical realities of enforcement and territoriality, preventing the court from being drawn into foreign disputes where its ultimate judgments would carry no weight.
How Does the DIFC Approach Compare to English High Court Jurisprudence?
The jurisdictional architecture governing the DIFC Court's power to grant interim relief in support of foreign-seated arbitrations requires a delicate balance between judicial support and territorial overreach. In English jurisprudence, the power to grant interim relief under Section 44 of the Arbitration Act 1996 is strictly policed, requiring a sufficient connection to the jurisdiction or a clear enforcement nexus. The DIFC Court, operating under its own statutory framework, faces the exact same conceptual boundary. The applicants in Oleksei v Olorun attempted to bypass this boundary by invoking the broad language of the DIFC's procedural statutes, seeking urgent interim injunctive relief to halt the implementation of contested elections of 19 December 2025.
The statutory framework governing these applications is dual-tracked, comprising the general powers under the New Court Law and the arbitration-specific powers under the Arbitration Law. In the present dispute, the applicants initially cast a wide net. However, the legal debate rapidly narrowed. As H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke observed, the arbitration-specific provisions provided no independent jurisdictional hook:
I should say here, that no reliance was placed on Article 24.3 of the Arbitration Law and I agree that it adds nothing to the debate and do not therefore consider it further.
This narrowing forced the applicants to rely entirely on the general precautionary powers. The court noted the foundational premise of their argument:
Article 15 of the New Court Law, under the heading “Interim and Precautionary Measures” provides that “the DIFC Courts have jurisdiction to hear and determine applications for interim or precautionary measures relating to ………..
The applicants argued that this provision, coupled with the DIFC's established role as a conduit jurisdiction, provided a sufficient basis for the court to intervene in a dispute seated in Milan and pending before the Milan Chamber of Arbitration. However, the court firmly rejected this expansive interpretation, aligning its reasoning directly with the English High Court's approach to the enforcement nexus.
The critical battleground was the interpretation of the Privy Council's landmark decision in Broad Idea International Ltd v Convoy Collateral Ltd [2021] UKPC 24. To understand the gravity of the court's ruling, one must look to the historical evolution of the English injunction jurisdiction. For decades, the Siskina doctrine dictated that an English court could only grant an interlocutory injunction if it was ancillary to a pre-existing cause of action triable within the English courts. The Privy Council in Broad Idea modified that strict territorial requirement, holding that a freezing injunction could be granted in support of foreign proceedings, provided there was a realistic prospect that the resulting foreign judgment would be enforced in the local jurisdiction.
The applicants in Oleksei v Olorun attempted to stretch this enforcement-based jurisdiction beyond its breaking point. They sought to wield Broad Idea as a jurisdictional blank cheque, arguing that the power to grant injunctions is not strictly tethered to a pre-existing cause of action within the forum. H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke dismantled this argument by returning to the fundamental character of the relief sought:
The judgment of Lord Legatt in Broad Idea (ibid) does not advance the Applicant’s arguments. In that case, as pointed out at paragraphs 84-85, a freezing injunction is different in character from other interlocutory injunctions which grant, on a temporary and provisional basis the substantive relief claimed by the applicant.
This distinction is paramount in both English and DIFC jurisprudence. A freezing injunction, as Lord Legatt elucidated, exists to prevent the frustration of the court's enforcement process. It does not enforce a substantive right; it merely holds the ring so that a future judgment is not rendered hollow. In contrast, the relief sought by the applicants—restraining the validation of an election and mandating the preservation of all Electoral Records—was substantive in nature. It sought to govern the conduct of the parties pending the arbitral award, a power that properly belongs to the arbitral tribunal or the courts of the seat. The court drew a hard line between preserving assets for execution and granting substantive interim relief:
As stated above, the enforcement principle as enunciated in Broad Idea (ibid) and the DIFC cases which drew on that decision for support, does not assist the Applicants. Unlike in the situation where freezing orders have been granted and enforcement in the DIFC of a foreign Court money judgement (or arbitral award to the same effect) could be foreseen, the orders sought in the Milan arbitration would not give rise to any potential for enforcement in the DIFC.
The alignment with English principles becomes even more pronounced when examining the "thwarting" test. The DIFC Court adopted the formulation articulated by H.E. Justice Michael Black, which perfectly encapsulates the English approach to ancillary jurisdiction:
As His Excellency Justice Michael Black said at paragraph 59, “the question is whether there is a sufficient likelihood that a judgement enforceable through the process of the BVI court will be obtained and a sufficient risk that without a freezing injunction, execution of the judgement will be thwarted, to justify the relief.
Applying this test to the facts of Oleksei v Olorun, the fatal flaw in the applicants' case was exposed. The relief sought in the Milan arbitration was declaratory and injunctive—it concerned corporate governance and electoral validity within an onshore Dubai entity. Even if the applicants were entirely successful in Milan, the resulting arbitral award would not be a money judgment capable of execution against assets in the DIFC. The putative award from the Milan tribunal would determine the validity of the corporate governance actions taken by the First Respondent. The enforcement of such an award would necessitate action by the onshore Dubai courts, not the DIFC Courts. There are no assets in the DIFC to seize, no DIFC-based conduct to compel, and no DIFC-registered shares to transfer. The court articulated this reality with absolute clarity:
Transported into the case of an interlocutory injunction of the kind sought here, the question is whether execution of a judgement in the DIFC would be thwarted without such relief to which the answer is no because no such judgement in the terms of the putative award could
Which Earlier DIFC Cases Frame This Decision?
The dismissal of the injunction application in Oleksei v Olorun [2026] DIFC ARB 005 does not exist in a doctrinal vacuum. Rather, H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke’s ruling represents a critical crystallization of the boundaries governing the DIFC Courts’ supervisory and supportive jurisdiction. For over a decade, the DIFC has cultivated a reputation as a robust, pro-arbitration jurisdiction, frequently acting as a conduit for the enforcement of foreign awards. However, the applicants in this dispute attempted to stretch that supportive architecture beyond its breaking point, seeking urgent interim injunctive relief to halt an onshore Dubai election pending an arbitration seated in Milan. By rejecting this maneuver, the Court reinforced a vital distinction: the DIFC’s willingness to support foreign arbitrations is strictly tethered to its capacity to eventually enforce the resulting award within its own territorial remit.
To understand the mechanics of Justice Cooke’s reasoning, one must first look to the foundational precedent that the applicants implicitly sought to exploit: ARB-003-2013: Banyan Tree Corporate PTE Ltd v Meydan Group LLC [2013] DIFC ARB 003. The Banyan Tree doctrine established that the DIFC Courts possess jurisdiction to recognize and enforce foreign arbitral awards even when the award debtor has no assets within the DIFC. This created the widely utilized "conduit jurisdiction," allowing parties to ratify awards in the offshore common law court before taking them onshore for execution. The applicants in Oleksei effectively attempted to reverse-engineer this doctrine. Their logic presumed that because the DIFC could theoretically enforce a future Milan award, the DIFC Court must therefore possess the ancillary jurisdiction to grant interim measures protecting the subject matter of that arbitration today.
Justice Cooke dismantled this presumption by interrogating the specific nature of the relief sought. The applicants were not asking to freeze assets to secure a future monetary judgment. Instead, they demanded an order restraining the Respondents from validating the results of a contested election for the Board and President of the First Respondent, alongside the preservation of all Electoral Records. This distinction is fatal to the invocation of conduit jurisdiction. A conduit strategy relies on the eventual translation of an arbitral award into a recognizable DIFC judgment. An order dictating the governance of an onshore entity based on an onshore election cannot be executed within the DIFC.
The applicants’ reliance on the enforcement jurisdiction principle, heavily influenced by the Privy Council’s landmark decision in Broad Idea International Ltd v Convoy Collateral Ltd [2021] UKPC 24, further exposed the flaws in their jurisdictional theory. Broad Idea revolutionized the common law understanding of freezing injunctions, confirming that a court can freeze assets within its jurisdiction to support foreign proceedings, even if no substantive claim is brought locally. The applicants attempted to graft this principle onto their request for an interlocutory injunction. Justice Cooke firmly rejected this conflation, noting that the mechanics of asset preservation are fundamentally different from granting substantive, albeit temporary, relief:
The judgment of Lord Legatt in
Broad Idea
(ibid) does not advance the Applicant’s arguments. In that case, as pointed out at paragraphs 84-85, a freezing injunction is different in character from other interlocutory injunctions which grant, on a temporary and provisional basis the substantive relief claimed by the applicant.
This analytical wedge separates Oleksei from cases where the DIFC Court has willingly deployed its injunctive powers in support of foreign proceedings. When a party seeks a freezing order, the court is protecting its own future enforcement jurisdiction—ensuring that when the foreign award arrives, there are assets left to satisfy it. As Justice Cooke observed, drawing on the broader common law consensus, the core question in freezing order applications is whether the execution of a future judgment will be thwarted without intervention.
When that same test is applied to the interlocutory injunction sought by the Oleksei applicants, the jurisdictional foundation collapses. The Court cannot protect an enforcement jurisdiction it will never possess. Justice Cooke articulated this limitation with precise clarity:
Transported into the case of an interlocutory injunction of the kind sought here, the question is whether execution of a judgement in the DIFC would be thwarted without such relief to which the answer is no because no such judgement in the terms of the putative award could be executed in the DIFC in any event.
17.
The territorial disconnect in Oleksei was absolute. The arbitration was seated in Milan. The underlying dispute concerned an election held in onshore Dubai. The entities involved were onshore entities. The Court noted that it was entirely clear from the filings that no relevant nexus to the financial centre existed:
It is clear on the face of the Claim Form, the Application and the Affidavits sworn in support that it is not said that any documents to be preserved are within the DIFC nor that any action to be restrained would, if not restrained, take place within the DIFC.
This lack of territorial connection neutralized the applicants' statutory arguments. While they invoked Article 15.4 of Dubai Law No. 2 of 2025 (the New Court Law) and Article 24.3 of the DIFC Arbitration Law, neither provision grants the DIFC Courts a roving commission to police onshore disputes. The statutory power to grant interim measures is expansive but not infinite; it requires a hook. In cases where the DIFC is the seat of arbitration, the supervisory jurisdiction provides that hook. In cases where the DIFC is merely a potential place of enforcement, the hook must be the realistic prospect of executing the resulting award against assets or persons within the DIFC.
The ruling aligns with the restrictive approach to enforcement jurisdiction seen in recent complex commercial disputes, such as DEC-001-2025 DEC 001/2025 Techteryx Ltd v (1) Aria Commodities , where the Court has increasingly demanded rigorous proof that its intervention is both statutorily grounded and practically executable. The DIFC Court will not issue orders in vain, nor will it allow its pro-arbitration framework to be weaponized by litigants seeking tactical advantages in disputes that belong before the onshore Dubai Courts or the supervisory courts of the arbitral seat.
Justice Cooke’s analysis of the enforcement principle definitively shuts the door on using the DIFC as a clearinghouse for global interlocutory relief. The distinction between preserving assets for a monetary award and dictating the governance of an onshore entity is the dividing line between legitimate judicial support and jurisdictional overreach:
As stated above, the enforcement principle as enunciated in Broad Idea (ibid) and the DIFC cases which drew on that decision for support, does not assist the Applicants. Unlike in the situation where freezing orders have been granted and enforcement in the DIFC of a foreign Court money judgement (or arbitral award to the same effect) could be foreseen, the orders sought in the Milan arbitration would not give rise to any potential for enforcement in the DIFC.
The procedural posture of the respondents further emphasized the speculative nature of the application. While the First Respondent ostensibly took a neutral position in early skeleton arguments, they ultimately opposed the injunction at the hearing, aligning with the Fourth Respondent’s challenge to the Court’s jurisdiction. The fact that three of the defendants did not even acknowledge service suggests a broader recognition that the DIFC Court was an inappropriate forum for the relief sought.
Ultimately, the decision in Oleksei serves as a necessary recalibration of the Banyan Tree legacy. While the DIFC remains a vital conduit for the enforcement of foreign arbitral awards, that conduit is strictly unidirectional—it flows toward the execution of recognizable judgments. It cannot be reversed to project injunctive power into foreign-seated arbitrations concerning onshore disputes where no DIFC enforcement is possible. Justice Cooke’s final assessment of the jurisdictional fatal flaw leaves no room for ambiguity:
There is no question of the Court’s jurisdiction to enforce a foreign judgment or award being thwarted absent the grant of the injunction sought because the Court could not enforce the award in the terms sought by the Applicants in the arbitration.
By dismissing the application, the Court has provided crucial clarity for practitioners navigating the complex interface between onshore Dubai, the offshore DIFC, and foreign arbitral seats. The DIFC Courts will robustly support arbitration, but only within the strict territorial and functional limits of their statutory mandate.
What Does This Mean for Practitioners Regarding Costs and Procedural Compliance?
The allocation of costs following a defeated jurisdictional application frequently serves as a barometer for judicial tolerance regarding litigation conduct. In Oleksei v Olorun [2026] DIFC ARB 005, H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke delivered a costs order that functions as a strict regulatory boundary for cross-border practitioners. By aggressively pruning the respondents' costs schedules, the Court sent an unequivocal message: the urgency of an anti-arbitration or precautionary injunction does not grant a blank cheque for excessive billing, nor does it suspend the strict regulatory requirements governing who may practice before the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Courts.
The baseline for the costs assessment was established by the claimants' failure to secure their requested injunction. Having assessed the costs payable following the 26 January 2026 hearing, the Court ordered the claimants to pay AED 92,000 to the First Respondent and AED 87,177.82 to the Fourth Respondent. The Court mandated that the claimants must remit these sums within 28 days of this Order. However, the final figures mask a severe judicial haircut applied to the initial sums claimed, revealing a highly scrutinised approach to summary assessment under Part 38 of the Rules of the DIFC Courts (RDC).
The most severe penalty in the ruling fell upon the First Respondent's attempt to recover fees generated by foreign counsel. In international arbitrations—particularly those seated in foreign jurisdictions like Milan—parties routinely rely on home-jurisdiction lawyers to coordinate global strategy. Yet, when seeking or defending ancillary relief within the DIFC, the local procedural perimeter is absolute. The First Respondent sought to recover AED 90,000 for the services of an Italian lawyer. Justice Cooke rejected the claim entirely, enforcing the strict requirement that only legal practitioners registered under Part 1 of the DIFC Courts’ Rules of Conduct may recover fees for conducting litigation within the jurisdiction.
(c) AED 90,000 is claimed in respect of an Italian lawyer’s fees who is not registered under Part 1 and are disallowed in total as not incurred reasonably in connection with the claim.
This total disallowance reinforces a critical compliance doctrine: foreign counsel cannot shadow-litigate DIFC proceedings and expect the losing party to foot the bill. The DIFC Courts maintain a rigorous registration regime to ensure that practitioners appearing before them are bound by the Court's ethical and procedural codes. Attempting to bypass this by funnelling foreign legal fees through a local costs schedule will be struck down as unreasonably incurred. This strict territorial policing of legal representation echoes the Court's broader jurisdictional vigilance, a theme similarly explored in DEC-001-2025 DEC 001/2025 Techteryx Ltd v (1) Aria Commodities , where procedural boundaries were rigorously enforced against non-compliant actors.
Beyond the prohibition on unregistered foreign counsel, Justice Cooke wielded the summary assessment mechanism to aggressively reduce solicitors' costs that were deemed disproportionate to the work actually performed. The First Respondent claimed AED 85,500 in solicitors' costs. The Court reduced this to AED 60,000, explicitly citing the limited scope of what was done. The Fourth Respondent faced an even steeper reduction. From a total claim of AED 116,655, the Court carved out the legitimate disbursements for Counsel's fees (AED 37,177.82) but found the remaining solicitors' costs to be excessive to a significant extent, slashing the balance to a flat AED 50,000.
In each case it is appropriate to assess the costs on a summary basis. However, there is good reason for reducing the sums claimed to sums reasonably incurred in the circumstances outlined above.
The dichotomy between the treatment of Counsel's fees and solicitors' costs is highly instructive for litigation strategy. Justice Cooke allowed the disbursements for Counsel's fees in full for both the First and Fourth Respondents (AED 32,000 and AED 37,177.82, respectively). This indicates a judicial recognition that the substantive advocacy required to defeat an urgent injunction at a hearing justifies premium specialist fees. Conversely, the heavy reductions applied to the background solicitors' costs suggest a judicial scepticism toward inflated preparation hours in cases where the core jurisdictional defence is relatively narrow. Practitioners must recognise that summary assessment in the DIFC is not a rubber-stamping exercise; it is an active audit of proportionality.
Equally compelling is the Court's approach to awarding costs to parties whose participation was tactically minimal but ultimately successful. The First Respondent's pre-hearing contribution consisted of a mere three-page skeleton argument that did not even expressly object to the orders sought. Yet, at the oral hearing, the First Respondent's counsel adopted the jurisdictional arguments advanced by the Fourth Respondent. Rather than penalising the First Respondent for a lack of original briefing, Justice Cooke rewarded the tactical efficiency of aligning with a winning argument.
The First Respondent served a 3 page skeleton in which it made no express objection to the orders sought but at the Hearing jumped on the Fourth Respondents’ bandwagon relating to jurisdiction and by counsel argued against the grant of the injunction on other grounds. It too is entitled to an order for costs.
This "bandwagon" ruling provides a vital tactical blueprint for multi-party arbitral disputes. When multiple respondents face a unified application for precautionary measures, there is no requirement for each respondent to duplicate the heavy lifting of drafting bespoke jurisdictional challenges. Efficient alignment at the hearing, provided it contributes to the defeat of the application, is sufficient to trigger an entitlement to costs. The Court prioritises the substantive outcome over the volume of paper generated.
The Fourth Respondent's entitlement to costs further clarifies the protective scope of the DIFC Courts' jurisdiction. The claimants argued that the Fourth Respondent was not accused of any direct wrongdoing in the underlying onshore election dispute. However, because the claimants chose to serve her with the application, she was forced to appear and defend her position.
There was arguably no reason for the Fourth Respondent to appear at all as she was not accused of any wrongdoing but as she was served and succeeded in showing that the Court had no jurisdiction to make the orders sought, she is entitled to a costs order in her favour.
By awarding costs to the Fourth Respondent, the Court penalised the claimants for over-broad service. If a claimant casts a wide net in an injunction application, dragging peripheral parties into the DIFC jurisdiction, they bear the financial risk when those parties successfully challenge the Court's authority to hear the matter. This principle aligns with the broader jurisprudence seen in cases like ARB 027/2024 Nalani v Netty, where the financial consequences of procedural overreach are strictly enforced against the offending party.
Despite the strictness applied to unregistered counsel and excessive billing, Justice Cooke demonstrated procedural forbearance regarding administrative deadlines, provided no substantive harm occurred. The respondents submitted their costs schedules late. Under a draconian reading of the RDC, this could have jeopardised their recovery. However, the Court noted that no prejudice has been suffered by the claimants, who still had ample opportunity to make submissions on the late schedules. This pragmatic distinction—forgiving administrative delays that cause no prejudice while ruthlessly striking down substantive breaches like unregistered foreign counsel—illustrates a sophisticated, commercial approach to case management.
Ultimately, the costs order in Oleksei v Olorun operates as a detailed compliance manual for arbitration practitioners navigating the DIFC Courts. It confirms that while the Court will protect respondents from over-broad injunctions and award costs even for minimal, tactical participation, it will not subsidise inefficient litigation. The total disallowance of the Italian lawyer's fees stands as a stark warning: the DIFC Courts' jurisdiction is a closed regulatory ecosystem. Parties who attempt to import foreign legal expenses without adhering to Part 1 registration requirements will find those costs entirely unrecoverable, regardless of their success on the merits.
What Issues Remain Unresolved in the Wake of Oleksei v Olorun?
The dismissal of the injunction in Oleksei v Olorun [2026] DIFC ARB 005 exposes a persistent fault line in the United Arab Emirates’ bifurcated legal system. While H.E. Justice Sir Jeremy Cooke decisively shut the door on the applicants’ attempt to restrain an onshore Dubai election via a Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Court order, the underlying tension between onshore Dubai governance and DIFC-seated or foreign-seated arbitration remains a fertile ground for litigation. Claimants increasingly view the DIFC Courts as a potential conduit to secure urgent relief that might be procedurally cumbersome to obtain in the onshore Dubai Courts. In Oleksei, the applicants sought to leverage the DIFC’s jurisdiction to pause the implementation of a contested elections of 19 December 2025 for the Board and President of the First Respondent, pending the constitution of an arbitral tribunal in Milan.
The strategy of bypassing local courts by framing substantive onshore disputes as ancillary to foreign arbitrations tests the very limits of what constitutes a "precautionary measure." The applicants relied heavily on the newly enacted Dubai Law No. 2 of 2025 (the "New Court Law"), attempting to stretch its provisions to cover acts occurring entirely outside the financial free zone. The statutory gateway for such relief is narrow:
Article 15 of the New Court Law, under the heading “Interim and Precautionary Measures” provides that “the DIFC Courts have jurisdiction to hear and determine applications for interim or precautionary measures relating to ………..
Yet, the statutory language inherently demands a territorial or enforcement nexus. Justice Cooke’s analysis reveals that the DIFC Courts will not act as a global policeman for foreign arbitrations absent a clear connection to the Centre. The court scrutinised the geographical reality of the requested relief, noting that the applicants failed to establish any physical or legal footprint within the DIFC jurisdiction. The application sought the preservation of Electoral Records and Legal Opinions, alongside the exclusion of a specific electoral list, but critically failed to locate these elements within the court's reach:
It is clear on the face of the Claim Form, the Application and the Affidavits sworn in support that it is not said that any documents to be preserved are within the DIFC nor that any action to be restrained would, if not restrained, take place within the DIFC.
This strict territorial reading leaves open the question of how the DIFC will handle increasingly complex multi-jurisdictional disputes involving onshore entities where the lines are blurred. What if the onshore entity holds assets within the DIFC, or the electoral records were stored on servers physically located within the Centre's boundaries? The binary outcome in Oleksei was dictated by the complete absence of any DIFC footprint. Future litigants will undoubtedly attempt to manufacture such a footprint to anchor jurisdiction, forcing the court to delineate exactly how much territorial connection is required to enliven Article 15.4. The intended onshore claim against the Second and Third Respondents pursuant to Article 84 of Federal Decree-Law No. 32 of 2021 further complicates the landscape, highlighting the intricate dance between federal commercial companies law and offshore arbitral support.
A critical unresolved issue lies in the application of the enforcement principle derived from the Privy Council’s landmark decision in Broad Idea International Ltd v Convoy Collateral Ltd [2021] UKPC 24. The applicants attempted to stretch the Broad Idea doctrine—which allows courts to grant freezing injunctions in support of foreign proceedings if a resulting judgment would be enforceable in the jurisdiction—to cover interlocutory injunctions granting substantive, albeit temporary, relief. Justice Cooke firmly rejected this conflation, drawing a sharp line between asset preservation and substantive interference:
The judgment of Lord Legatt in Broad Idea (ibid) does not advance the Applicant’s arguments. In that case, as pointed out at paragraphs 84-85, a freezing injunction is different in character from other interlocutory injunctions which grant, on a temporary and provisional basis the substantive relief claimed by the applicant.
The distinction between preserving assets for future execution and granting temporary substantive relief is paramount. A freezing order does not give the claimant the ultimate relief sought in the underlying arbitration; it merely ensures that the arbitral award will not be a pyrrhic victory. Conversely, the injunction sought in Oleksei—halting the implementation of an election—was effectively the exact relief the applicants would seek from the Milan tribunal. By restraining the Respondents from validating the election results, the DIFC Court would have been stepping into the shoes of the Milan arbitrators, granting substantive relief without any jurisdictional mandate to do so.
This brings the analysis to the threshold for a "sufficient likelihood" of enforcement, a standard that the court may need to further clarify in future cases. Justice Cooke drew upon the jurisprudence of H.E. Justice Michael Black KC, noting the specific requirements for enlivening the court's supportive jurisdiction in the context of foreign proceedings:
As His Excellency Justice Michael Black said at paragraph 59, “the question is whether there is a sufficient likelihood that a judgement enforceable through the process of the BVI court will be obtained and a sufficient risk that without a freezing injunction, execution of the judgement will be thwarted, to justify the relief.
Applying this to the facts of Oleksei, the fatal flaw in the applicants' strategy was the nature of the putative Milan award. Even if the applicants succeeded in Milan and obtained an award declaring the onshore election invalid, that award would not be executable against assets in the DIFC. It would require enforcement in onshore Dubai, where the First Respondent is domiciled and where the election took place. The DIFC Court's enforcement machinery is designed to execute monetary awards against assets within its jurisdiction, or to recognise awards for onward execution in onshore Dubai. It is not designed to enforce declaratory relief regarding the internal governance of an onshore entity with no DIFC presence.
Transported into the case of an interlocutory injunction of the kind sought here, the question is whether execution of a judgement in the DIFC would be thwarted without such relief to which the answer is no because no such judgement in the terms of the putative award could be executed in the DIFC in any event.
The ruling explicitly curtails the expansive interpretation of the DIFC's supportive jurisdiction seen in earlier, more aggressive applications. As seen in cases like ARB-005-2025: ARB 005/2025 Nashrah v (1) Najem (2) Nex, the DIFC Courts have historically been willing to flex their jurisdictional muscles to protect the integrity of arbitrations with a clear DIFC seat. However, when the seat is foreign (Milan) and the target is onshore Dubai, the jurisdictional hook must be robust. Justice Cooke noted that the enforcement principle simply did not assist the applicants because the orders sought in the Milan arbitration would not give rise to any potential for enforcement in the DIFC.
The procedural maneuvering in the case also highlights the tactical complexities of multi-party onshore disputes spilling into the DIFC. The First Respondent ostensibly took a neutral position in a skeleton argument served prior to the hearing, only to pivot and actively oppose the injunction alongside the Fourth Respondent during oral submissions. The decision raises questions about the utility of joining multiple respondents who have no connection to the relief sought. The Fourth Respondent actively criticised the Applicants for joining her in the proceedings at all, a point that resonated given the ultimate dismissal of the application. The tactical use of the DIFC Courts to exert pressure on onshore actors, even those tangentially related to the core dispute, is a strategy that will likely face increased scrutiny and potential costs sanctions in the wake of this judgment. The court reserved costs, ordering written submissions, signaling that jurisdictional overreach may carry a financial penalty.
Looking ahead, the boundary between the DIFC and onshore Dubai will continue to generate complex litigation, particularly as corporate structures become increasingly intertwined across the two zones. The DIFC Courts have consistently maintained that they are not a court of convenience for disputes lacking a statutory nexus. The dismissal in Oleksei aligns with the cautious approach to parallel proceedings and jurisdictional boundaries observed in recent jurisprudence, such as DEC-001-2025 DEC 001/2025 Techteryx Ltd v (1) Aria Commodities . Ultimately, the DIFC Courts' power to grant interim measures under the New Court Law is inextricably linked to the court's ultimate power of enforcement. Where a foreign arbitral award will require execution exclusively in onshore Dubai, the DIFC Courts will decline to act as a preliminary injunction tribunal. The limits of 'precautionary measures' will continue to be tested as claimants seek to bypass local courts, but Justice Cooke has drawn a firm line: without a credible path to DIFC enforcement or a physical DIFC nexus for the acts to be restrained, the application will fail at the jurisdictional hurdle.