Poland Falls Foul Of EU Court For Judicial Reform

Brussels, March 2 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 2nd Mar, 2021 ) :The EU Court of Justice on Tuesday found Poland's judicial reform "liable to infringe EU law" by preventing judges turned down for supreme court posts from having the decisions reviewed.

The verdict, handed down by the EU court's Grand Chamber of 15 judges that hears cases against member states, adds to previous rulings against Poland for changes over the past six years to its judicial system, seen by critics -- and the European Commission -- as undermining judges' independence.

It states that "guarantees of independence and impartiality required under EU law presuppose the existence of rules governing the appointment of judges".

Poland's supreme court referred the case to the EU court to settle a question of law over how to proceed with challenges lodged by five judges who were rejected for supreme court seats by the National Council of the Judiciary (KRS in its Polish initials) in 2018.

The EU Court of Justice noted that after a 2019 amendment to Polish law, "it became impossible to lodge appeals against decisions of the KRS" concerning judicial appointments.

Further, it said the system of having the KRS filter nominations and appoint its own choices as judges risked "giving rise to legitimate doubts" as to the neutrality of the appointed judges.

The resulting situation was "liable to lead to those judges not being seen to be independent or impartial," thus undermining a central pillar necessary "in a democratic society governed by the rule of law".

- EU actions against Poland - The EU court did not say whether the 2018 and 2019 amendments introduced by Poland's ruling Law and Justice Party broke European Union law.

Instead it said that was a matter for "the referring court" -- Poland's supreme court -- to decide.

But it noted that court, obliged to apply EU law over Polish law, must "disapply those amendments" and use the previous law to hear the excluded judges' challenges.

The European Commission has launched several actions against Poland in the EU Court of Justice, deeming Warsaw as deviating from the rule of law and European democratic norms.

In 2017 the EU executive started an "Article 7 procedure" against Poland under the Treaty on European Union.

Theoretically, that could end up with Poland being stripped of its right to vote in EU proceedings.

But Poland and Hungary -- which is also in hot water with the commission for perceived rule of law breaches -- have a mutual protection pact that protects each from the unanimous EU vote needed for that measure to be passed.