Opinion of the Advocate General — ECLI:EU:C:2000:490
Date: 2000-09-21
Language of the case: French
Based on: Treaty establishing the European Economic Community (1957)
Subject matter: Right of establishment;Freedom to provide services;Telecommunications
Procedure: Action for failure to fulfil obligations - successful
Origin: Luxembourg

Summary of the Judgment 
Approximation of laws — Telecommunications services — Common framework for 
general authorisations and individual licences — Directive 97/13 — Individual 
licences — Procedures for granting individual licences — Nature of the decisions to be 
taken 
(European Parliament and Council Directive 97/13, Art. 9(2)) 
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SUMMARY — CASE C-448/99 
The requirements that a decision be taken 
quickly by the competent authorities, as 
required by Directive 97/13 on a common 
framework for general authorisations and 
individual licences in the field of telecom­
munications services, and the absence of 
any reference to the decision as being 
interim in nature demonstrate that the 
second indent of Article 9(2) of the direc­
tive, which provides that a Member State 
must inform an applicant for an individual 
licence of its decision within a period no 
longer than six weeks, is to be interpreted 
as meaning that the decisions which must 
be taken within that period are definitive. 
(see para. 19) 
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