Appeal brought on 14 February 2020 by Archimandritis Sarantis Sarantos, Protopresvyteros Ioannis Fotopoulos, Protopresvyteros Antonios Bousdekis, Protopresvyteros Vasileios Kokolakis, Estia Paterikon Meleton, Christos Papasotiriou, Charalampos Andralis, against the order of the General Court (Ninth Chamber) delivered on 11 December 2019 in Case T-547/19, Sarantis Sarantos v European Parliament, Council of the European Union and European Commission
(Case C-84/20 P)
Language of the case: Greek
Parties
Appellants: Archimandritis Sarantis Sarantos,
Protopresvyteros Ioannis Fotopoulos,
Protopresvyteros Antonios Bousdekis,
Protopresvyteros Vasileios Kokolakis,
Estia Paterikon Meleton,
Christos Papasotiriou,
Charalampos Andralis,
(represented by: C. Papasotiriou, dikigoros)
Other parties to the proceedings: European Parliament, Council of the European Union
Form of order sought
The appellants claim that the Court should:
rule on their action of 31 July 2019, without referring the order under appeal back to the General Court;
set aside the order registered under case number 923557, of 11 December 2019, of the Ninth Chamber of the General Court of the European Union relating to the abovementioned action and uphold that action in its entirety;
annul Regulation (ΕU) 2019/1157 1 of 20 June 2019;
order the other parties to the proceedings to pay the costs.
Pleas in law and main arguments
In support of the appeal, the appellants rely on two grounds of appeal:
First ground of appeal, by which it is submitted that the order under appeal, in dismissing their action as inadmissible and ruling, first, that, ‘…the contested regulation does not affect the applicants who are natural persons by reason of certain characteristics peculiar to them or a factual situation distinguishing them from all other persons, but by reason of their beliefs, which are professed, potentially or in practice, by an indefinite number of persons. Consequently, those applicants are not individually concerned by the contested regulation within the meaning of the fourth paragraph of Article 263 TFEU’, infringed the fourth paragraph of Article 263 TFEU, Article 19 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union, the principle of proportionality, the preamble and Articles 47 and 52(1) of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (2000/C 364/01), Article 5(1) and (4) of the Treaty on European Union (individually and in conjunction with Protocol No 2 on the application of the principle of proportionality), as well as the relevant case-law. This is because, by their action, the appellants submit that the contested regulation infringes their human rights, including the fundamental rights laid down in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (human dignity, religious belief, right to object on the grounds of freedom of religion, personal life and liberty, personal data, the right to express consent for all processing of that data), so that the regulation is of direct and individual concern to them and, by reason of the very nature of the rights affected as fundamental human rights, they are entitled to bring an action for annulment before the General Court under the fourth paragraph of Article 263 TFEU, and the General Court is obliged to review the validity of the regulations in the event of a breach of fundamental human rights.
Second ground of appeal, based on the fact that the General Court, when making the order under appeal, ruled that the representation of the sixth applicant before that court by the lawyer Christos Papasotiriou was inadmissible, because ‘the … sixth applicant did not avail of the services of a lawyer, a third party, to be represented, but acted in his own name, signing the application himself and availing of his status as a lawyer on the basis of the identity document referred to in Article 51(2) of the Rules of Procedure …’, and thereby misinterpreted, contra legem, the provision of Article 19 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union and infringed Article 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and the principle of proportionality, as well as the relevant provisions of EU legislation guaranteeing that principle.
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1 Regulation (EU) 2019/1157 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 June 2019 on strengthening the security of identity cards of Union citizens and of residence documents issued to Union citizens and their family members exercising their right of free movement (OJ 2019 L 188, p. 67).