Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:2002:619
Date: 2002-10-24
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: Agriculture and Fisheries;External relations;Fruit and vegetables;General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT);Commercial policy;Bananas
Procedure: Appeal - unfounded;Appeal - inadmissible;Action for damages
Origin: Germany

Summary of the Judgment 
1. Appeals — Pleas in law — Plea against a ground of the judgment not necessary to 
support the operative part — Plea inoperative 
(Statute of the Court of Justice, Art. 58, first subpara.) 
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SUMMARY — CASE C-122/01 P 
2. Appeals — Pleas in law — Incorrect assessment of the facts — Inadmissible — 
Review by the Court of justice of assessment of evidence — Excluded unless the sense 
of evidence has been distorted 
(Art. 225(1) EC; Statute of the Court of justice, Art. 58, first subpara.) 
1. It is settled case-law that in appeal 
proceedings the Court of Justice will 
reject outright complaints directed 
against grounds of a judgment of the 
Court of First Instance included purely 
for the sake of completeness since they 
cannot lead to the judgment's being set 
aside. 
(see para. 17) 
2. It is settled case-law that in appeal 
proceedings the Court of Justice has no 
jurisdiction to establish the facts or, in 
principle, to examine the evidence 
which the Court of First Instance 
accepted in support of those facts. 
Provided that the evidence has been 
properly obtained and the general 
principles of law and the rules of 
procedure in relation to the burden of 
proof and the taking of evidence have 
been observed, it is for the Court of 
First Instance alone to assess the value 
which should be attached to the evi­
dence produced to it. That appraisal 
does not therefore constitute, save 
where the clear sense of the evidence 
has been distorted, a point of law 
which is subject as such to review by 
the Court of Justice. 
(see para. 27) 
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