Professor Graham Butler:

I will answer the second question first. I am not sure that the Rosneft case is the clear basis we should be looking at here. The Rosneft case was about the adoption of a specific EU legal Act, namely a restrictive measure vis-à-vis a legal person in a third state. That was about the lawfulness of the EU using the measure here, whereas what we are talking about in the context of the proposed Bill is an EU member state measure. With respect, I would say the analogy is slightly imperfect.

That said, there are other cases where the potential public policy exception has been invoked. There are not many cases where it has been invoked with regard to the common commercial policy, that is, to external trade.