Judicial Review of Sports Arbitration in Kosovo and Comparison with Recent EU Practice

The relationship between state courts and specialized sports arbitration bodies remains an evolving issue in many jurisdictions. For the first time, two recent judgments of the Commercial Court of Kosovo (“the Court”) aim to clarify the role of Kosovo’s regular courts in reviewing decisions rendered by the Sports Arbitration Council (“SAC”), a body operating within the Kosovo Olympic Committee (“KOC”), which is an organization responsible for developing, promoting and protecting the Olympic movement in Kosovo.

The article will provide a comprehensive overview of how the Court assessed its jurisdiction in both cases, with a take that the reasoning leaves important questions unanswered regarding the circumstances in which domestic courts may review sports arbitration decisions. Thereafter, a recent judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) will be tackled in comparison with the above-mentioned local judgments, as it has set a powerful precedent with regard to EU court review of sports arbitration.

The Approach of the Commercial Court

In the Judgment of 27 May 2025, the Court considered an action brought by the Swimming Federation of Kosovo against the KOC. The claimant had been affected by a decision of the KOC and had sought its annulment by the SAC, claiming that it entailed discrimination of an athlete and a coach. The SAC President, without examining the merits of such request, had issued a decision declining jurisdiction over the matter (‘the SAC Decision”). The claimant initiated proceedings before the Court for the annulment of the SAC decision, claiming, inter alia, alleged violations of procedural and substantive legal provisions, as well as claims for damages resulting from the alleged discrimination. The claimant argued before the Court that the SAC President lacked authority under the SAC Regulation to decide jurisdictional issues unilaterally. In support of its claim, the claimant relied on Article 36 of Kosovo’s Law No. 02/L-75 on Arbitration (“the Law on Arbitration), which sets out the grounds upon which the Court may annul an arbitral award.

Referring to the provisions of Law No. 08/L-277 on Sports (“Law on Sports”), the Court rejected the claim, noting that the SAC and the Court for Sports Arbitration within the SAC (“the SAC Court”) are statutory bodies established within the KOC and entrusted with resolving disputes arising within the sports system, including disputes involving the KOC, sports federations, clubs, athletes, and other sports organisations. The Court held that the annulment mechanism provided under the Law on Arbitration applies exclusively to arbitral awards rendered in economic and commercial disputes. In its view, commercial arbitration as such constitutes an alternative dispute resolution mechanism for disputes that would otherwise fall within the jurisdiction of ordinary courts and are referred to arbitration by agreement of the parties. By contrast, sports arbitration was characterised as a statutory mechanism established under the Law on Sports, rather than a consensual form of commercial arbitration. Consequently, the Court concluded that decisions issued by the SAC cannot be challenged through annulment proceedings under the Law on Arbitration. This reasoning was subsequently affirmed by the Appeals Chamber in Judgment K.DH.SH.II.1211/25 of 6 February 2026. The Appeals Chamber further observed that the SAC Decision included the legal advice that the appropriate avenue of appeal was the Court of Arbitration for Sport (“CAS”) in Lausanne, which according to the Appeals Chamber, was also in accordance with the applicable SAC regulation.

Similar as to the case above, the Court had rejected jurisdiction over the enforcement of a SAC decision in another judgment, KE.nr. 187/24  of 23 April 2025. In this case, the claimant had also relied on the Law on Arbitration, namely, Article 38, which governs the enforcement of arbitral awards. The Court reasoned that the Law on Sports establishes a distinct enforcement mechanism for sports arbitration decisions. Specifically, the responsibility for ensuring compliance with SAC decisions lies with the competent sports authorities, including the Sports Agency and the Sports Inspectorate, rather than the Court, concluding that decisions rendered by the SAC are not subject to the enforcement regime established by the Law on Arbitration.

Does the Reasoning go Far Enough?

Although the outcome in both cases appears correct, the reasoning adopted by the Court may prove overly restrictive if applied more broadly. The analysis suggests that regular courts lack jurisdiction over sports arbitration matters altogether. However, such conclusion is difficult to reconcile with the SAC Regulation itself. For the purposes of this analysis, reference is made to the current SAC Regulation. Although the judgments discussed above were issued under the previous version of the Regulation, the relevant provisions have remained materially unchanged.

Article 50 provides that decisions of the SAC Court are final, binding, and immediately enforceable. The same provision further allows dissatisfied parties to appeal the merits of those decisions to CAS in Lausanne within thirty days of receipt of the award. However, Article 56 expressly recognizes the jurisdiction of regular courts in limited circumstances. It permits judicial review in limited circumstances listed exhaustively, including when the SAC Court has wrongly declared jurisdiction over the dispute.

Going back to the first case, it appears that, rather than invoking the Law on Arbitration, the claimant could have relied directly on Article 56 of the SAC Regulation, which expressly allows judicial review where the SAC has wrongly decided on jurisdiction. Had the claim been framed on that basis, the Court would have been required to address whether it possessed jurisdiction under the SAC Regulation instead of dismissing the claim solely because the Law on Arbitration was inapplicable. In the second case, however, the court correctly concluded that it lacked authority to enforce sports arbitration awards. Both the Law on Sports and the SAC Regulation establish a separate enforcement mechanism under which SAC decisions are immediately enforceable and compliance is supervised by the competent sports authorities, namely, the Sports Agency and the Sports Inspectorate.

The CJEU’s Recent Jurisprudence: A European Benchmark for Judicial Review

The question of the relationship between sports arbitration and judicial review has acquired wider significance following a recent judgment of the CJEU in Joined Cases C-424/24 and C-425/24. The approach of CJEU therein provides a useful guidance based on which the judicial review under Kosovo’s sports arbitration framework can be assessed.

The case concerned disciplinary sanctions imposed by the Italian Football Federation (“FIGC”) on a former chairman and former member of the board of directors of the Juventus Football Club. The sanctions prohibited the individuals from pursuing professional activities within the FIGC for 24 months and were subsequently extended internationally. This global extension of the sanctions restricted the free movement of the affected parties to work and/or provide services in other EU member states and thus EU law was triggered, which led to the sanctions being challenged before the competent administrative court in Italy, which then referred questions to the CJEU.

In its Judgment of 16 July 2026, the CJEU referred to Article 19(1) Treaty of the European Union (“TEU”) in conjunction with Article 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (“EU Charter”), where the principle of effective judicial protection of individual parties’ rights and freedoms under EU law is enshrined. It found that that insofar as a dispute concerns a sanction that allegedly infringes one or more fundamental freedoms of movement conferred on them by EU law, the competent national court must be able to review the merits in the light of EU law, of the legal and factual reasons for imposing such a sanction, and of that sanction stricto sensu. In such a case, the CJEU established that both the annulment of the act imposing that sanction, as well as the ability to grant interim relief pending the decision on the substance of the case, is necessary to ensure the effective judicial protection of the individual concerned.

The CJEU’s reasoning preserves a distinction between the autonomy of sports adjudication and judicial review required to protect public policy. It sets a clear precedent that the autonomy of sports organisations and their available adjudication remedies can be subject to limitations when their decisions and/or awards are in conflict with public policy matters, and especially with supranational EU principles (see previous coverage on the Blog here and here). 

Takeaways and Conclusion

In the Kosovo framework, Article 56 of the SAC Regulation already recognizes that SAC decisions are not entirely exempt from review by Kosovo’s regular courts, although such decisions are stated to be final and non-appealable. As such, it seems to reflect, at least in part, the same underlying distinction drawn by the CJEU between the autonomy of sports adjudication and the need for external judicial control in certain circumstances. In particular, Article 56 preserves a limited role for the regular courts in relation to jurisdictional, procedural, and public-policy concerns.

The CJEU judgment highlights a question that is left unanswered by the Court’s reasoning, as to what the scope and remedial effect of the judicial review is expressly preserved by Article 56 of the Regulation. The existence of Article 56 suggests that the relationship between the SAC and Kosovo’s regular courts is more nuanced than a simple distinction between commercial arbitration, which is subject to the Law on Arbitration, and sports arbitration, which is not. Therefore, it appears that future cases will likely require the courts to engage more directly with Article 56 and to distinguish between three different forms of review: appeals on the merits, which the Regulation directs to CAS; limited judicial review on the grounds expressly identified in Article 56; and enforcement, which the Regulation treats separately.