The CJEU has ruled that it is competent to process compensation against the EU civilian mission in Kosovo

BRUSSELS, September 10 () –

The Court of Justice of the European Union has stated on Tuesday that the court itself is competent “to assess the legality of acts or omissions” not directly related to decisions of the Common European Security Policy, after some Kosovar citizens asked for compensation from the EULEX Kosovo mission for not investigating crimes of which their relatives had been victims and the General Court of the EU declared itself incompetent to analyze the case.

This brings to an end a dispute before the European Court that dates back to the war in Kosovo when the close relatives of missing persons invoked before the General Court of the EU the violation of their fundamental rights in order to request compensation, which was rejected by the court based in Luxembourg at first instance, stating that it did not have jurisdiction to hear the case.

All this after the Human Rights Review Group of the EULEX mission closed the files of both relatives despite concluding that various fundamental rights had been violated, although noting that the head of EULEX had “only partially implemented the recommendations” of the Group.

In this regard, the CJEU states that the competence of the European Court of Justice in matters of common foreign policy provided for in the EU treaties “is not incompatible with the right to effective judicial protection”. In its opinion, the inclusion of foreign policy in the European legislative framework means that respect for the rule of law and fundamental rights must be guaranteed, “values ​​that require that the authorities of the Union be subject to judicial control”.

It thus declares that European justice is competent to assess the legality of acts or omissions in the field of the common foreign policy “which have no direct relationship with political or strategic choices or to interpret them.”

The Court thus reverses the ruling of the General Court which declared itself incompetent to hear the action for compensation and follows the opinion of the EU Advocate General who argued last year that the infringement of fundamental rights cannot be a “political option” in the EU and its judicial bodies must be competent to ensure that foreign policy decisions “do not cross red lines.”