CELEX: C1996/064/46
Language: en
Date: 1996-03-02 00:00:00
Title: Action brought on 3 January 1996 by Neue Maxhütte Stahlwerke GmbH against the Commission of the European Communities (Case T-2/96)

2 . 3 . 96           I EN 1              Official Journal of the European Communities                                No C 64/23
Action brought on 22 December 1995 by Lando Tinelli                 The applicant claims that the Court should:
  against the Commission of the European Communities
                        Case T-242/95 )                             — order the defendants to pay to the applicant milk quota
                         ( 96/C 64/44                                   compensation ( SLOM-II ) for the period from 2 April
                                                                        1984 to 13 June 1991 , amounting to DM 118 436,52 ,
                                                                        together with 8 % interest from 19 May 1992, and to
                 (Language of the case: Italian)                        pay the costs of the proceedings and the applicants'
                                                                        experts ' fees in the sum of DM 1 961,90,
An action against the Commission of the European                    — stay the proceedings.
Communities was brought before the Court of First
Instance of the European Communities on 22 December
1995 by Lando Tinelli, a former official of the Commission          Pleas in law and main arguments adduced in support:
of the European Communities, residing in Rome,
represented by Giuseppe Marchesini, advocate with the               The pleas in law and main arguments are the same as those
right of audience before the Corte di Cassazione of the             in Case T-20/94 .
Italian Republic, with an address for service in Luxembourg
at the Chambers of Ernest Arendt, 8—10 Rue Mathias
Hardt .
The applicant claims that the Court should:
                                                                    Action brought on 3 January 1996 by Neue Maxhütte
— annul the applicant's pension statements as from
     January 1995 on the grounds set forth in the
                                                                    Stahlwerke GmbH against the Commission of the European
                                                                                             Communities
     application,
                                                                                              Case T-2/96 )
— order the Commission to pay the amounts due in their                                        ( 96/C 64/46 )
     entirety, together with interest at 8 % calculated from
     the dates on which they fell due,                                             (Language of the case: German)
— order the defendant to pay the costs of the
     proceedings.                                                   An action against the Commission of the European
                                                                    Communities was brought before the Court of First
                                                                    Instance of the European Communities on 3 January 1996
The pleas in law and main arguments are analogous to those          by      Neue      Maxhütte        Stahlwerke    GmbH         of
in Case T-238/95 Francesco Mongelli v. Commission .                 Sulzbach-Rosenberg ( Germany), represented by Rainer
                                                                    Bierwagen ( Rechtsanwalt ) of Brussels, with an address for
                                                                    service in Luxembourg at the Chambers of Elvinger and
                                                                    Dessoy, 31 Rue d'Eich.
                                                                    The applicant claims that the Court should:
Action brought on 2 January 1996 by Bernhard
                                                                    — annul Commission Decision K(95 ) 2828 final of
Böcker-Lensing and Ludger Schulze-Beiering Gesellschaft
bürgerlichen Rechts against the Council of the European                  18 October 1995 in so far as it affects the applicant,
Union and the Commission of the European
                         Communities                                — order the Commission to pay the costs of the
                                                                        proceedings.
                          Case T-l /96 )
                          ( 96/C 64/45 )
                                                                    Pleas in law and main arguments adduced in support:
                (Language of the case: German)                      The applicant, Neue Maxhütte Stahlwerke GmbH of
                                                                     Sulzbach-Rosenberg, the ECSC steel producer to which
An action against the Council of the European Union and             loans described by the Commission as aids were granted,
the Commission of the European Communities was brought              maintains that the contested Decision infringes essential
 before the Court of First Instance of the European                  procedural requirements and principles.
 Communities on 2 January 1996 by Bernhard
 Böcker-Lensing and Ludger Schulze-Beiering Gesellschaft             In its submission, the Decision contained incorrect and
 bürgerlichen Rechts, Borken, represented by Bernd                   inadequate factual findings concerning the alleged aid .
 Meisterernst, Mechtild Düsing, Dietrich Manstetten and
 Dr. Frank Schulze, Rechtsanwälte, Münster, with an                  The proceedings concerning the privatization of Neue
 address for service in Luxembourg at the Chambers of                Maxhütte and the granting of the loans have the same
 Dupong & Associés, 14a Rue des Bains .                              subject-matter, since the granting of the loans is part of the
 ---pagebreak---  No C 64/24             EN                 Official Journal of the European Communities                                    2 . 3 . 96
 search for a successful means of privatization. By opening           The applicants claim that the Court should :
two sets of proceedings and not joining them in any way, the
 Commission artificially divided a subject-matter that was
 one and the same. The Decision should be set aside by                — order the Commission to pay the additional
reason of that unlawful division of the proceedings .                     remuneration resulting from applying the Berlin
                                                                          weighting for Germany to the part of the applicants '
                                                                          remuneration transferred in German marks during the
Article 2 of the Decision requires repayment of the alleged               period from 1 October 1990 to 31 December 1994,
aids by the undertakings concerned . As stated above, the
two sets of proceedings are inseparably related . In the event
of a court decision in favour of privatization in principle, the
loans granted would be set off and the second proceeding              — order the Commission to pay interest for delay on such
would become irrelevant. In this situation, the applicant is              additional remuneration at 10% per annum,
obliged to challenge the Commission Decision of
 18 October 1995 . In order to provide effective legal
protection for the applicant, either the investigation or the         — in so far as necessary, annul the Commission Decisions
repayment obligation in Article 2 should have been                        of 9 March 1995 and 4 October 1995 , rejecting the
suspended pending the court decision concerning                           applicants' claim and their complaint respectively,
privatization.
                                                                     — order the Commission to pay the costs.
The Commission did not give the applicant a proper hearing
before making its Decision, and did not send the views of
competitors to the applicant for comment.
                                                                      Pleas in law and main arguments adduced in support:
The loans granted did not constitute aid within the meaning
of Article 4 (c ) of the ECSC Treaty. That was apparent from
                                                                     The applicants, who are Commission officials employed in
the facts, the Commission having misunderstood the                    Luxembourg, state that, using their right under Annex VII
circumstances which led the Region of Bavaria to grant the
                                                                     to the Staff Regulations, they had part of their remuneration
loans . From the legal point of view, an aid can only exist if a     transferred to Germany. Under Article 17 ( 3 ) of Annex VII,
private investor in a similar position would not have made a
                                                                     the amounts transferred were adjusted by the coefficient
similar loan . That requirement was not satisfied in this
case .
                                                                     resulting from the ratio between the weighting for Germany
                                                                     and the weighting for Luxembourg. Until 1 July 1994, the
                                                                     date from which Council Regulation ( ECSC, EC, Euratom )
                                                                     No 3161 /94 of 19 December 1994 adjusting, with effect
                                                                     from 1 July 1 994, the remuneration and pensions of officials
                                                                     and other servants of the European Communities and the
                                                                     weightings applied thereto ( OJ No L 335 , 1994, p. 1 ) took
                                                                     effect, the weighting for Germany had remained fixed at the
                                                                     Bonn level, although Berlin had been proclaimed the capital
                                                                     of Germany on 3 October 1990 . The applicants consider
                                                                     that they are entitled to additional payments, reflecting the
                                                                     weighting for Germany calculated at the Berlin level, in
Action brought on 10 January 1996 by Roland Haas and                 respect of the part of their remuneration transferred to
four others against the Commission of the European                   Germany as from 1 October 1990 . Their claims to that
                           Communities                               effect have, however, been rejected by the Commission .
                          ( Case T-3/96 )
                            ( 96/C 64/47 )
                                                                     The applicants maintain that the rejection infringes
                                                                     Articles 63 and 65a of the Staff Regulations . Under those
                                                                     provisions, the weighting for each Member State is to be
                (Language of the case: French)                       fixed in relation to the cost of living in its capital; Berlin
                                                                     became the capital of Germany on 3 October 1990 . They
                                                                     argue that the Commission was not entitled to use a
An action against the Commission of the European                     Regulation which failed to provide for retrospective
Communities was brought before the Court of First                    calculation of the weighting at the Berlin level as from
Instance of the European Communities on 10 January 1996              1 October 1990, and is obliged to recalculate the coefficient
by Roland Haas, Hans-Werner Schmidt, Siegfried                       affecting the portions of salary transferred as from
Schweikle, Albert Veith and Horst Wohlfeil , resident in             3 October 1990 and to pay them the difference .
Luxembourg, represented by Georges Vandersanden and
Laure Levi, of the Brussels Bar, with an address for service in
Luxembourg at the offices of Fiduciaire Myson SARL, 1                They also argue that the Commission has disregarded the
Rue Glesener.                                                        effects of the judgments in Cases T-64/92 and T-536/93 , in