The Federal Trade Commission had been campaigning to curb such tactics and succeeded in eliminating them for several years but was stymied when two appeals courts ruled in 2005 that such do-not-compete settlements are a legitimate way to settle patent disputes.
The United States Court of Appeals in Manhattan said that the lawyers represented retailers with competing interests in the settlement, which was once valued at $7.25 billion, one of the largest in antitrust history.
In the meantime, Iraqi legislators said Sunday that they were making progress on two more key benchmarks urged by the Bush administration: the approval of an oil revenue sharing law and the settlement of competing claims to the contested northern city of Kirkuk.
She nevertheless stresses that more than one ethnic group can have formative ties to a given territory, and that there might be competing claims based on settlement.
Both at a global and at a local level, the area of fertile soils is limited and is increasingly under pressure by competing land uses for settlement, infrastructure, raw materials extraction, agriculture, and forestry.
Negotiations with the Palestinians are now set to enter their delicate final stage, with the future of Jewish settlements and competing claims in Jerusalem two of the most sensitive issues.
The meeting, he said, was a settlement negotiation concerning competing claims to the same property.
Given the res judicata effects of settlement in some instances, parallel litigation can encourage plaintiffs' counsel to settle earlier than they otherwise would to avoid being bound by a settlement in a competing case and losing out on contingency fees.
Opposition to the gambling center by Congress and from a tribe with a competing casino had blocked a settlement for years.
The distribution of these plans during three periods in the region's history reflects the extent of competing Mormon and non-Mormon settlement, as well as the eventual accommodation of Mormon and non-Mormon influences within a broader national frame.
