Skip to content

News from Micula: The Court of Justice Clarifies the Temporal Application of EU State Aid Rules and Confirms the Relevance of Achmea · Case C-638/19 P European Commission v European Food SA and Others (Micula) · Annotation by Vasiliki Dolka

Annotation of the Judgment of the Court of Justice (Grand Chamber) of 25 January 2022 in Case C-638/19 P European Commission v European Food SA and Others ('Micula')

Vasiliki Dolka

DOI https://doi.org/10.21552/estal/2022/1/10

Keywords: arbitral award of damages compensation after accession, Bilateral Investment Treaty, Investor State Arbitration, temporal application of State aid rules


On 25 January 2022, the Court of Justice (CJ) overturned the judgment of the General Court (GC) that had annulled a 2015 European Commission (Commission) State aid decision declaring the payment of compensation granted by an arbitral award for violation of the 2003 Romania-Sweden Bilateral Investment Treaty, as unlawful and incompatible State aid. The GC annulled the Commission Decision for lack of competence ratione temporis to assess the measure as it considered the aid to have been granted before Romania’s accession to the EU. To the contrary, the CJ considers that the critical date at which the right to receive the aid is conferred to the beneficiary coincides with the granting of the right to compensation. On this ground, the CJ reinstates the Commission’s competence to review the aid. It also confirms the relevance of the Achmea ruling, by concluding that any consent that may have been given by an EU Member State to participate in international investment arbitration proceedings before its accession to the EU lacks any legal force post accession. The CJ has remanded the case back to the GC to decide on the merits.

Vasiliki Dolka (LLM College of Europe) is a competition lawyer based in Brussels. The views expressed in this case note are exclusively those of the author. For correspondence: <mailto:vasiliki.dolka@coleurope.eu>.

Share


Lx-Number Search

A
|
(e.g. A | 000123 | 01)

Export Citation