Keywords

Summary



Keywords

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1 . Common commercial policy - Protection against illicit commercial practices - Discretion of the Commission - Extent of the review by the Court in the context of an application brought by undertakings whose request for protective measures has been rejected - Decision on whether the practices criticized are compatible with the GATT rules - Subject to review

( Council Regulation No 2641/84 )

2 . International agreements - GATT - Interpretation and application by the Court for the purposes of its review of decisions adopted by the Commission in connection with protection against illicit commercial practices

( General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade; Council Regulation No 2641/84, Art . 2(1 ) and Art . 3 )

3 . International agreements - GATT - Assessment of a system of differential export duties in the light of the GATT rules - Inapplicability of Articles III and XI - Irrelevance of Articles XX and XXIII

( General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, Arts . III, XI, XX and XXIII )

Summary

1 . In the context of the application of Regulation No 2641/84 regarding protection against illicit commercial practices, undertakings which have, in order to secure the adoption of protective measures, lodged a complaint which was rejected by a decision of the Commission are entitled to have the merits of that decision reviewed by the Court, provided that the decision confines itself to the finding that the practice complained of is not contrary to the provisions of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade and contains no assessment of the Community' s interest in the initiation of an examination procedure or even of the injury or threat of injury to the Community industry concerned .

2 . It does not follow from the fact that various GATT provisions are not capable of conferring on citizens of the Community rights which they can invoke before the courts that those citizens may not, in proceedings before the Court, rely on the provisions of GATT in order to obtain a ruling on whether conduct criticized in a complaint lodged under Article 3 of Regulation No 2641/84 constitutes an illicit commercial practice within the meaning of that regulation . The provisions of GATT form part of the rules of international law to which Article 2(1 ) of that regulation refers, as is borne out by the second recital in conjunction with the fourth recital in its preamble .

The flexibility which characterizes the provisions of GATT in several areas does not prevent the Court from interpreting and applying the rules of GATT regarding a given case, in order to establish whether certain specific commercial practices should be considered incompatible with those rules . The GATT provisions have an independent meaning which, for the purposes of their application in specific cases, is to be determined by way of interpretation .

The provision in GATT for a special procedure for the settlement of disputes between contracting parties does not preclude the interpretation of GATT by the Court, because the mere fact that the contracting parties have established a special institutional framework for consultations and negotiations inter se in relation to the implementation of the agreement is not in itself sufficient to exclude all judicial application of that agreement .

It follows that, since the economic agents concerned are entitled to rely on the GATT provisions as a basis for their complaint, they may request the Court to review the legality of the Commission' s decision applying those provisions .

3 . A system of differential export duties which imposes a heavier charge on the exportation of a product in its raw state than it does on that of the products processed from it does not fall within the scope of Article III of GATT, the purpose of which is to avoid any discrimination against imported products in favour of domestic ones, in the form of internal charges and rules .

Article XI does not apply to the system either, because, regardless of the method of calculation used, it does not relate to restrictions arising inter alia from taxes and other charges .

Moreover, in determining whether or not such a system is compatible with the GATT rules, Article XX, which does not lay down any general prohibition existing in its own right, and Article XXIII, which contains procedural provisions but no specific substantive rule, are also irrelevant .