1 By application lodged at the Court Registry on 19 June 1996, the Commission of the European Communities brought an action under Article 169 of the EC Treaty for a declaration that, by not adopting within the prescribed period the laws, regulations and administrative provisions necessary to comply with Council Directive 92/119/EEC of 17 December 1992 introducing general Community measures for the control of certain animal diseases and specific measures relating to swine vesicular disease (OJ 1993 L 62, p. 69), the Kingdom of Belgium has failed to fulfil its obligations under the EC Treaty.
2 Article 27 of the directive provides that Member States are to bring into force the measures necessary to comply with the directive before 1 October 1993 and forthwith to inform the Commission thereof.
3 Since it had received no communication from the Belgian Government of the measures transposing the directive, the Commission initiated proceedings for failure to fulfil obligations under Article 169 of the Treaty and sent a letter of formal notice to the Belgian Government on 3 December 1993, requesting it to submit its observations within a period of two months.
4 The Belgian Government did not reply to that letter and on 26 September 1994 the Commission sent a reasoned opinion requiring it to adopt the measures necessary to comply with the opinion within two months of its notification.
5 By letter of 9 October 1995 the Belgian authorities informed the Commission that the existing legislation partially satisfied the requirements of the directive and that a draft royal decree completing its transposition was almost ready.
6 Since then, the Commission has received no further communication from the Belgian authorities.
7 It was in those circumstances that the Commission brought the present action.
8 The Kingdom of Belgium does not deny that it has not, until now, adopted all the measures necessary to transpose the directive. It points out that, in so far as the directive is not covered by the existing legislation, two royal decrees must still be adopted in order to complete the transposition. It justifies the delay in adopting those measures on the grounds of the budgetary implications of one of the two decrees.
9 It is, however, settled case-law that a Member State cannot rely on provisions, practices or situations of its own internal legal order in order to justify its failure to respect the obligations and time-limits laid down by a directive (see, in particular, Case C-107/96 Commission v Spain [1997] ECR I-3193, paragraph 10).
10 Since the directive was not transposed within the period prescribed therein, the action brought by the Commission in relation to it must be regarded as being well founded.
11 It must therefore be held that, by not adopting within the prescribed period the laws, regulations and administrative provisions necessary to comply with the directive, the Kingdom of Belgium has failed to fulfil its obligations under Article 27 thereof.