page_title: Court of Cassation (Belgium)
section_title: Court structure
hierarchical_section_title: Court of Cassation (Belgium) / Court structure
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: portrait de Jean-Louis van Dievoet (1777-1854), époux de Jeanne Wittouck, secrétaire du Parquet de la Cour de Cassation à Bruxelles. Huile sur toile, 61 cm x 70 cm, signé BRICE, daté 1826 et signé à gauche à hauteur de l'échancrure du jabot.
context_page_description: The Court of Cassation of Belgium is the supreme court of the Belgian judiciary. The Court is composed of thirty judges with life tenure who are nominated by the High Council of Justice of Belgium and appointed by the Belgian federal government. The Court handles cases in the two main languages of Belgium, being Dutch and French, and provides certain facilities for cases in German. The Court is assisted in its work by a public prosecutor's office and a bar association, which both function separately from other structures. The duty of the public prosecutor's office is to provide advisory opinions to the Court on how the law ought to be interpreted and applied. The attorneys of the Court's bar association assist litigants in proceedings before the Court; in certain cases their assistance is mandatory.
  The Belgian Court of Cassation was originally modelled after its French namesake, and its jurisdiction and powers are still very similar to those of its French counterpart. The Court is a court of cassation; meaning that it only hears appeals in last resort against decisions of lower courts and tribunals, and only on points of law.
caption: Jean-Louis van Dievoet (1777-1854) was the first secretary to the Court's prosecutor's office, after the Kingdom's independence.
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