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Commission v. Kadi

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Clemens A. Feinäugle
Clemens A. Feinäugle*
Affiliation:
Max Planck Institute, Luxembourg
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Extract

In the joined cases brought by the European Commission (Commission), the United Kingdom, and the Council of the European Union (EU) against Yassin Abdullah Kadi, decided on July 18, 2013, the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ or Court) sustained the judgment of the General Court that had annulled the Commission regulation freezing Kadi’s funds in accordance with the mandate of the United Nations Security Council’s sanctions committee. The ECJ ruled that, although the majority of the reasons relied on by EU authorities for listing Kadi were sufficiently detailed and specific to allow him to exercise his rights of defense and judicial review effectively, no information or evidence had been produced to substantiate the allegations, when challenged by Kadi, that he had been involved in activities linked to international terrorism.

Keywords

UN Security Councilcounterterrorism sanctionsUN sanctions committeesjudicial reviewassets freezingright to be heard
Type
International Decisions
Information
American Journal of International Law , Volume 107 , Issue 4 , October 2013 , pp. 878 - 884
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of International Law 2013

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References

1 Joined Cases C-584/10 P, C-593/10 P, & C-595/10 P, Commission v. Kadi (Eur. Ct. Justice July 18, 2013) [hereinafter Kadi II]. The decisions and opinions of the General Court and the Court of Justice of the European Union are available at http://curia.europa.eu.

2 See SC Res. 1267 (Oct. 15, 1999), 1333 (Dec. 19, 2000), 1363 (July 30, 2001), 1388 (Jan. 15, 2002), 1390 (Jan. 16, 2002), 1452 (Dec. 20, 2002), 1455 (Jan. 17, 2003), 1456 (Jan. 20, 2003), 1526 (Jan. 30, 2004), 1617 (July 29, 2005), 1699 (Aug. 8, 2006), 1730 (Dec. 19, 2006), 1732 (Dec. 21, 2006), 1735 (Dec. 22, 2006), 1822 (June 30, 2008), 1904 (Dec. 17, 2009), 1989 (June 17, 2011), 2083 (Dec. 17, 2012).

3 After the death of Osama bin Laden, the consolidated list of designated persons was divided into the Al-Qaida Sanctions List and a separate list dealing with individuals and entities associated with the Taliban, which is admin istered by a newly established sanctions committee. See SC Res. 1988, para. 1, & 1989, paras. 2, 3 (June 17, 2011).

4 There are currently about 288 names of individuals and entities on the Al-Qaida Sanctions List, see SC Comm. Pursuant to Resolutions 1267 (1999) and 1989 (2011), The List Established and Maintained by the Committee (Sept. 11, 2013), at http://www.un.org/sc/committees/1267/consolist.shtml, and about 135 names on the list dealing with the individuals and entities associated with the Taliban, see SC Comm. Established Pursuant to Resolution 1988 (2011), List of Individuals and Entities (June 27, 2013), at http://www.un.org/sc/committees/1988/list.shtml.

5 Council Regulation (EC) 881/2002, 2002 O.J. (L 139) 9.

6 Commission Regulation (EC) 2062/2001, 2001 O.J. (L 277) 25.

7 Case T-315/01, Kadi v. Council, 2005 ECR II-3649.

8 Joined Cases C-402/05 P & C-415/05 P, Kadi v. Council, 2008 ECR I-6351 [hereinafter Kadi I ] (reported by Mišsa Zgonec-Rozžej at 103 AJIL 305 (2009)).

9 Id., paras. 348–49, 370.

10 Id., paras. 372–76.

11 Commission Regulation (EC) 1190/2008, 2008 O.J. (L 322) 25.

12 Case T-85/09, Kadi v. Commission, 2010 ECR II-5177.

13 Appeal Brought by the European Commission Against the Judgment of the General Court in Case T-85/09, 2011 O.J. (C 72) 9; 2011 O.J. (C 72) 9 (EU Council appeal); 2011 O.J. (C 72) 10 (UK appeal).

14 The ECJ had already applied the principles of Kadi I in joined cases C-399/06 P & C-403/06 P, Hassan v. Council, 2009 ECR I-11393, paras. 69–75.

15 Case T-318/01, Othman v. Council, 2009 ECR II-1627. The UK Supreme Court in Her Majesty’s Treasury v. Ahmed, [2010] UKSC 2, [249], [2010] 2 A.C. 534, held that the national order implementing the UN Qaeda sanctions regime was ultra vires and annulled it insofar as it did not provide for an effective remedy.

16 The UN Human Rights Committee, in its views on Sayadi v. Belgium, found that the travel ban under the sanctions regime violated freedom of movement under Article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Dec. 16, 1966, 999 UNTS 171, and that the accessibility of the list on the Internet violated complain ants’ honor and reputation under Article 17 of the Covenant. Communication No. 1472/2006, paras. 10.8, 10.12, UN Doc. CCPR/C/94/D/1472/2006 (Oct. 22, 2008).

17 E.g., Case T-134/11, Al-Faqih v. Commission. See Analytical Support and Sanctions Implementation Monitoring Team, Thirteenth Report, Litigation Relating to Individuals on the Al-Qaida Sanctions List, para. 8, UN Doc. S/2012/968, Annex I, at 31 (Dec. 31, 2012) [hereinafter Litigation Relating to Individuals].

18 Nada v. Switzerland, App. No. 10593/08, para. 212 (Eur. Ct. H.R. Sept. 12, 2012) (Grand Chamber), at http://hudoc.echr.coe.int (quoting Kadi I, supra note 8, para. 299).

19 Kadi v. Geithner, Civ. No. 09-0108, 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 36053 (D.D.C. Mar. 19), appeal dismissed, 2012 U.S. App. LEXIS 17174, at *52–56 (D.C. Cir. July 31, 2012). Kadi voluntarily dismissed the appeal. See Litigation Relating to Individuals, supra note 17, at 32.

20 See UN Press Release SC/10785, Security Council Al-Qaida Sanctions Committee Deletes Entry of Yasin Abdullah Ezzedine Qadi from Its List (Oct. 5, 2012), at http://www.un.org/en/unpress/index.asp.

21 Opinion of Advocate General Bot, Joined Cases C-584/10 P, C-593/10 P, & C-595/10 P (Mar. 19, 2013).

22 Id., paras. 86–90, 96–109, 110. The UN sanctions monitoring team was happy with these suggestions: “[T]his standard ... would insulate the European Union authorities (and, by extension, the 1267 Committee) from the majority of legal challenges to listing decisions.” Analytical Support and Sanctions Implementation Monitoring Team, Fourteenth Report 3, 13, UN Doc. S/2013/467 (Aug. 2, 2013).

23 Bundesverfassungsgericht [BVerfG] [Federal Constitutional Court] May 29, 1974, 37 Entscheidungen Des Bundesverfassungsgerichts [Bverfge] 271 (FRG), 2C.M.L.R. 540 (1974) (Solange I)(holding that so long as European Community law did not provide adequate human rights protection, the German Constitutional Court could examine cases involving the implementation of EC law and thus apply the human rights standard of the German Constitution).

24 See Opinion of Advocate General Poiares Maduro, Case C-402/05 P, para. 51 (Jan. 16, 2008); Kadi I, supra note 8, para. 322.

25 SC Res. 2083, paras. 18, 19, & Annex II, para. 7(c) (Dec. 17, 2012).

26 Kokott, Juliane & Sobotta, Christoph, The> Kadi Case—Constitutional Core Values and International Law— Finding the Balance? , 23 Eur. J. Int’l L. 1015, 1022, 1024 (2012)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

27 See Clemens A. Feinäugle, The Exercise of Public Authority in International Law 358 (2011) (Eng. summary). See also Gráinne de Búrca, The European Court of Justice and the International Legal Order After Kadi, 51 Harv. Int’l L. J. 1, 43, 49 (2010), who favors a “soft constitutionalist approach” that seeks to mediate the relationship between the norms of the different legal systems.