Al-Ateeqi v Kuwait Investment Authority: EAT upholds state immunity in sovereign wealth fund whistleblowing claim

The Employment Appeal Tribunal has upheld a finding that the Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA) is immune from whistleblowing detriment and unfair dismissal claims brought by the former chief executive of its London office. The tribunal held that his diplomatic status was inseparable from his employment.

In Al-Ateeqi v Kuwait Investment Authority [2026] EAT 169, Mr Justice Coppel dismissed both the appeal and the KIA's cross-appeal. He also gave obiter views, intended to assist any further appeal, that sovereign wealth fund management is itself an exercise of sovereign authority.

Background

The KIA manages Kuwait's reserve funds, including the Future Generations Fund, which the Kuwait Investment Office (KIO) in London largely manages. The claimant, a Kuwaiti national recruited from abroad, was appointed KIO chief executive in 2018. Under established practice, the role carried diplomatic status as Financial Attaché to the Kuwaiti Embassy. He was dismissed in 2022 and his diplomatic status was revoked.

The employment tribunal held that the KIA was a "separate entity" under section 14(1) of the State Immunity Act 1978, but that both conditions for immunity in section 14(2) were met.

Sovereign authority

The claimant argued that appointing a chief executive to manage investments was something any private actor could do, and that his diplomatic appointment was a separate act of the State of Kuwait. He relied on Estrada v Al-Juffali [2016] EWCA Civ 176.

Mr Justice Coppel rejected the argument. Applying I Congreso del Partido [1983] AC 244 and Lord Sumption's statement in Benkharbouche v Sudan [2017] UKSC 62 that every aspect of a diplomatic agent's employment is likely to be sovereign, he held that the overall context was decisive. The claimant's diplomatic status was integral to his role. He met government ministers and stood in for the ambassador. Diplomatic formalities followed automatically from appointment and dismissal.

Following Kuwait Investment Office v Hard [2022] EAT 51, the KIO was not recognised as part of the diplomatic mission, but that was not decisive. The KIA had also plainly acted "for and on behalf of" the state.

Would Kuwait have been immune?

On section 14(2)(b), the judge held that section 16(1)(a) would have excluded the employment exception in section 4 had Kuwait itself been the employer. Although the contract did not mention diplomatic status, it would be unduly narrow and artificial to read "employed under the contract as a diplomatic agent" as requiring an express term, where diplomatic appointment was established practice and followed automatically.

Obiter: sovereign wealth funds

On the cross-appeal, the judge disagreed with the tribunal's view that asset management is inherently private in character. Drawing on AIG Capital Partners v Kazakhstan [2005] EWHC 2239 (Comm) and Koo Golden East Mongolia v Bank of Nova Scotia [2007] EWCA Civ 1443, he considered that the purpose of a transaction can illuminate its juridical character. Managing state reserves for future generations was sovereign activity, and comparing the KIA to an investment bank whose clients "happen to be States" was misleading. Because the claimant's disclosures concerned the KIO's management of the fund, the proceedings would also relate to sovereign acts on that basis.

He further held that the tribunal was wrong to treat Kingdom of Spain v Lorenzo [2024] EWCA Civ 1602 as requiring a broad, rights-compatible reading of "commercial purposes" in section 4(3). Unlike the locally recruited claimant in Lorenzo, this claimant was a posted diplomat and not a victim of any Article 6 breach. With its commercial work forming only a small fraction of its activity, the KIO was not maintained for commercial purposes.

The judge noted there is no conclusive authority on sovereign wealth funds.