English abstract
This study explored the impact of fraud on the principle of independence of documentary credit by examining Omani law, comparative national laws, and the recognized international rules regarding documentary credits. The research found that the Omani legislator referred the detailed legal issues related to documentary credit and the mechanism of its interpretation, implementation, and codification to the Uniform Customs and Practice for Documentary Credits, which did not contain a text related to fraud occurring in documentary credit but rather referred this question to the applicable law of the contract. This reference would have negative consequences in practice, the most important of which is that the national banks find difficulty when applying the international standards used in regulating national and international documentary credit contracts, which can be addressed by developing a national regulation that is compatible with the internal situation of commercial banks in that country, taking into account the international rules and customs and the unified rules and customs issued by the international organizations.
The research also found divergence in scholarly opinions regarding the relativity of the principle of independence of documentary credit, which was confirmed by various judicial rulings across different countries. It is clear that the judicial trends emerging from comparative legislations differed and varied in the amount of care that the bank must exercise when verifying the documents that were signed. The assessment of the impact of fraud is kept to the court’s discretion in light of the circumstances surrounding the case lodged before it.
