EU Courts

EU Courts

The Court of Justice of the European Union is one of the EU institutions. It is based in Luxembourg. It is now composed of three different courts: the Court of Justice of the European Union (“Court of Justice” also known as the “ECJ”) (this wording therefore refers to both the European institution as a whole and to one of the Courts of that institution), the General Court of the European Union (“General Court”, formerly known as the “Court of First Instance” or “CFI”) and the European Union Civil Service Tribunal. In relation to DG Competition's activities, only the first two are relevant.

More about EU Courts

To keep it simple, for antitrust activities, the Court of Justice deals only with appeals from the General Court and questions referred to it by a national court. All other antitrust litigation is under the jurisdiction of the General Court. Judgments of the General Court can be appealed to the Court of Justice as of right.

More about the Subject

The General Court and the Court of Justice are composed of 27 judges (i.e. one per Member State). The Court of Justice also includes eight Advocates General who (as, opposed to the judges) do not decide on the case, but who provide the Court with their opinion of the case and the solution in law which should be applied in their view. Opinions of Advocates General are made public. The General Court does not have permanent Advocates General, but may appoint one in a given case of particular complexity, although it has not used that possibility for years.

Resources

See Also

References

• Information about EU Courts in the Antitrust Manual of Procedures for the application of Articles 101 and 102 TFEU (Internal DG Competition)

Further Reading

• Information about EU Courts in EU Competition Procedure, 3rd. Edition, Edited by Luis Ortiz Blanco (Oxford University Press)