On 14 June 2012, the EU General Court adopted two decisions separately Which Concluded that the EU legislation intended to apply the provisions of the Aarhus Convention (1) to the EU institutions, Regulation 1367/2006, is not fully in line with the Convention, It allows the public as to challenge only a very narrow categories of acts.
Instead of setting out to change the law and grant citizens their rights, the Commission decided to appeal the rulings."It is pure hypocrisy that on the one hand the Commission proclaims that 2013 will be the European Year of Citizens and at the same time launches appeals against court rulings that would give those same citizens greater rights to challenge violations of the law," said EEB General Secretary Jeremy Wates. "This comes on the heels of the Commission's equally disgraceful attempts to weaken the transparency requirements pertaining to information held by EU institutions."
Anais Berthier of ClientEarth said "These decisions are crucial as they address one of the most important violations of the Convention by the regulation and offer of opportunity to the EU institutions to correct the mistake they made when Adopting the Regulation of giving it too restrictive a scope .
The three institutions involved should embrace the opportunity to finally Provide access to justice for NGOs and confirm the basic democratic right to challenge unlawful decisions that damage the environment by asking the which institution has adopted it to review its legality. "The appropriate response from the Commission to the rulings would have been to start preparing a proposal to Strengthen the EU regulation 1367/2006 that is supposed to apply the Aarhus Convention to the EU institutions. Instead, it has decided to invest its Efforts into, at best, delaying citizens being able to exercise their rights and at worst, denying these all together.
However, the issue is Primarily a political one, not a legal one. At the heart of the matter is Whether the EU should be a Europe of citizens or a Europe of large institutions dominated by business interests. The current situation # in which businesses have access to the courts because they are able to prove a direct interest, Whereas NGOs concerned to protect the environment Thurs not, is unbalanced.
Through this decision, it is clear that the Commission under President Barroso's leadership has no desire to change this."As guardian of the Treaty, the Commission bears a special responsibility for Ensuring that EU law is Complied with," said Ms. Berthier. "Furthermore, it is responsible for the EU Ensuring that secondary legislation is adopted Which is lawful. International agreements are binding upon the EU institutions and to form integral part of EU law. It could be that first Argued failing to Ensure the compliance of EU law with an international agreement and then to the Court ruling that appealing Subsequently seeking to international agreement is being breached without sound legal arguments goes against the provisions of the Treaty itself. ""The arrogance that this decision reveals is staggering," said Mr. Wates. "They are spending taxpayers' money to attempt to limit the democratic rights of the public to have access to the courts to protect the environment. This is a kick in the teeth for the European public who the EU institutions are supposed to serve. "
(1) 1998 UNECE Convention on access to information, public participation in decision-making and access to justice in environmental matters (Aarhus Convention)
BACKGROUND NOTES
In Case T-338/08, the Applicant made a request NGO Pursuant to Article 10 of Regulation 1367/2006 to the Commission to review Regulation 149/2008 setting maximum residue levels for certain products [1].
In Case T-396/09, the NGOs asked the Commission to review the decision granting the Kingdom of the Netherlands a temporary exemption from the obligations laid down by Directive 2008/50/EC on ambient air quality and cleaner air for Europe [2].
In both cases, the Commission Considered the requests inadmissible as the acts were not concerned "administrative acts" as defined in Article 2 (1) (g) of Regulation 1367/2006 because they were not of individual scope
The General Court held that the regulation was not compatible with Aarhus Aarhus Convention with the regard to the types of acts that could be challenged. The Court Expressly Considered that, because Article 10 (1) of the Regulation limits the concept of "acts" that may be challenged by NGOs to "administrative acts" defined in Article 2 (1) (g) of the Regulation as "measures of individual scope ", it is not compatible with Article 9 (3) of the Convention.
