Case C-320/25 P: Appeal brought on 23 May 2025 by the Kingdom of Sweden against the judgment of the General Court (Tenth Chamber) of 12 March 2025 in Case T-485/22, Kingdom of Sweden v European Commission
Date: 2025-05-23
Institutions: Court of Justice
Subjects: EAFRD, EAGF, agricultural expenditure, agricultural land, aid to agriculture, eligibility criteria, land register, proof, reimbursement of aid








C_202503877EN.000101.fmx.xml












Official Journal of the European Union


EN
C series













C/2025/3877


21.7.2025






Appeal brought on 23 May 2025 by the Kingdom of Sweden against the judgment of the General Court (Tenth Chamber) of 12 March 2025 in Case T-485/22, Kingdom of Sweden v European Commission


(Case C-320/25 P)

(C/2025/3877)
Language of the case: Swedish

Parties


Appellant: Kingdom of Sweden (represented by: F.-L. Göransson and C. Meyer-Seitz)

Other parties to the proceedings: European Commission and Czech Republic

Form of order sought

The appellant claims that the Court of Justice should:






—


set aside in its entirety the judgment of the General Court of 12 March 2025 in Case T-485/22;










—


uphold the claims put forward by Sweden at first instance; and










—


order the Commission to pay Sweden’s costs in the proceedings before the Court.





Grounds of appeal and main arguments

The appellant claims that the General Court infringed EU law by the judgment under appeal.






1.


In the first place, the General Court erred in applying the principles related to the burden of proof as regards the conformity clearance procedure under 52(2) of Regulation 1306/2013. (1) The errors consisted in finding:






(a)


that the Commission had set out in a sufficiently clear manner the deficiencies it alleged against Sweden,










(b)


that the Commission had not altered its complaints in the course of the conformity clearance procedure,










(c)


that the Commission therefore had sufficient evidence to establish that there was a serious and reasonable doubt as to the existence of a systematic error in the land parcel database, and










(d)


that the burden of proof incumbent on Sweden had thus not been affected.














2.


In the second place, the General Court erred in applying the rules on updating the land parcel database (LPIS) and misconstrued the factual circumstances by failing to distinguish between the requirements for updating the LPIS land parcel database from the requirements for administrative and on-the-spot checks in order to ensure that the conditions for support for a particular year are satisfied. That led the General Court to draw erroneous conclusions on the alleged deficiencies in the Swedish system and on the nature and extent of the error in question.










3.


In the third place, the General Court erred in applying the rules on flat-rate corrections. As a result of a misinterpretation of the deficiencies that may be alleged against Sweden, the General Court rejected Sweden’s argument that the flat-rate correction at issue was clearly not in proportion to the damage which the alleged deficiencies might have caused to the EAGF and the EAFRD.






(1)  Regulation (EU) No 1306/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 December 2013 on the financing, management and monitoring of the common agricultural policy and repealing Council Regulations (EEC) No 352/78, (EC) No 165/94, (EC) No 2799/98, (EC) No 814/2000, (EC) No 1290/2005 and (EC) No 485/2008 (OJ 2013 L 347, p. 549).


ELI: http://data.europa.eu/eli/C/2025/3877/oj
ISSN 1977-091X (electronic edition)