Local district courts in Shenzhen to handle some foreign-related administrative cases

Shenzhen's district courts will handle administrative cases of first instance involving foreign, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan parties in Shenzhen starting Aug. 1, Shenzhen Special Zone Daily reported, quoting officials with the Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court.

The reform of the administrative case jurisdiction system is the first of its kind in the country.

The adjustment is in line with the decisions made by the Supreme People’s Court and the Guangdong Higher People’s Court, the Daily report said. The lawsuits won’t include major and complex cases that will negatively affect the society, according to the announcement of the intermediate court.

Fu Xinjiang, vice president of the Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court, said that since the implementation of China’s amended Administrative Procedure Law and the case-docketing registration system, the number of administrative cases has surged.

The Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court handled 196 cases involving foreign, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan parties in the past two years, accounting for 25 percent of the total cases in the same period, with 90 percent involving Hong Kong parties.

The majority of the cases involving Hong Kong parties are not major or complex — mostly administrative penalty, confirmation and requisition. Assignment of some administrative cases of first instance from intermediate to grassroots-level courts is beneficial to the parties and conducive to the substantive resolution of administrative disputes at the grass-roots level.

The announcement also said that for the above-mentioned cases, those in the environmental resources field will fall under the jurisdiction of the Longgang District People’s Court. Cases regarding intellectual property (patent and anti-trust cases excluded) will be handled by Shenzhen’s district courts. The rest of the cases will be under the jurisdiction of the Yantian District People’s Court.

The intermediate court will continue to handle the cases that have been accepted before Aug 1.