On January 21, the Luxembourg-based General Court of the European Court of Justice ruled that the European Platform Against Wind farms (EPAW) does not have “legal personality,” and therefore had no right to initiate a recourse in its chambers against the European Commission.
EPAW represents 649 associations of wind farm victims across Europe. It had brought a case against the European Union, denouncing Brussels’ new renewable energy targets for not respecting the rights of citizens to participate in environmental decision-making under the provisions of Aarhus Convention legislation.
Yet in a judgment dated January 18, 2007, the Court of Justice had declared admissible an appeal by the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), an organization with no legal personality, based outside the EU, and with a history of armed rebellion. The Court had then given value to the argument that "it is a question of avoiding excessive formalism” (case C-229/05 P).
Initially, the General Court had admitted EPAW’s recourse and processed it. Indeed, unincorporated bodies based in Ireland such as EPAW do not have to be constituted as registered associations to have certain rights regarding environmental matters. The Irish Supreme Court even confirmed on November 27, 2013 that in similar circumstances unincorporated bodies could bring matters into proceedings at the Irish High Court. These bodies argue that, lacking both time and resources, many groups of citizens cannot spend precious energy and money drafting legal statutes, organizing annual assemblies, writing minutes, doing secretarial work and filing reports to government(s).
Other EU institutions, like the European Ombudsman and the European Commission, did not refuse to process complaints submitted to them by EPAW. Neither have the United Nations in Geneva, which watches over the rights of the people in environmental matters under the Aarhus Convention. Furthermore, the Platform is registered (Nº 66046067830-67) on the EU’s Transparency Register, which provides information on organizations seeking to have a say in EU decision making.
On January 23, EPAW received from the General Court the defense memorandum of the European Commission, which had been lodged nearly four months earlier. Attached to that same email was the ruling of the Court, not permitting EPAW to challenge the arguments of the Commission, dismissing the case and ordering EPAW to pay the costs incurred by Brussels in defending itself.
“The Aarhus Convention stipulates that access to justice must be ‘free of charge or inexpensive’,” complains Mark Duchamp, of EPAW. “As a platform, we have no money, and our lawyer is working pro bono. What the Court has done is to castigate wind farm victims, whereas it had helped the armed group PKK to get its funds unfrozen by EU banks.
