Request for a preliminary ruling from the Conseil d’Etat (Belgium) lodged on 11 December 2014 — Commissaire général aux réfugiés et aux apatrides v Mostafa Lounani

(Case C-573/14)

Language of the case: French

Referring court

Conseil d’Etat

Parties to the main proceedings

Applicant: Commissaire général aux réfugiés et aux apatrides

Defendant: Mostafa Lounani

Questions referred

Is Article 12(2)(c) of Council Directive 2004/83/EC of 29 April 2004 on minimum standards for the qualification and status of third country nationals or stateless persons as refugees or as persons who otherwise need international protection and the content of the protection granted ¹ to be interpreted as necessarily implying that, for the exclusion clause provided for therein to be applied, the asylum seeker must have been convicted of one of the terrorist offences referred to in Article 1(1) of Council Framework Decision 2002/475/JHA of 13 June 2002 on combating terrorism, ² which was transposed in Belgium by the Law of 19 December 2003 on terrorist offences?

If the first question is answered in the negative, can acts such as those referred to in point 5.9.2 of the judgment under appeal (judgment No 96.933 of the Conseil du contentieux des étrangers), given on 12 February 2013, which were imputed to Mostafa Lounani by the judgment of the Tribunal correctionnel de Bruxelles of 16 February 2006 and resulted in his being convicted of participation in a terrorist organisation, be considered to be acts contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations within the meaning of Article 12(2)(c) of Directive 2004/83/EC?

For the purposes of considering the exclusion, on the grounds of his participation in a terrorist organisation, of a person seeking international protection, is the judgment convicting him of being a leading member of a terrorist organisation, which finds that the person seeking international protection has not committed, attempted to commit or threatened to commit a terrorist act, sufficient for a finding of the existence of an act of participation or instigation within the meaning of Article 12(3) of Directive 2004/83/EC imputable to that person, or is it necessary for an individual examination of the facts of the case to be made and participation demonstrated in the commission of a terrorist offence or instigation of a terrorist offence as defined in Article 1 of Framework Decision 2002/475/JHA of 13 June 2002 on combating terrorism?

For the purposes of considering the exclusion, on the grounds of his participation in a terrorist organisation of a person seeking international protection, possibly as a leading member, must the act of instigation or participation referred to in Article 12(3) of Directive 2004/83/EC relate to the commission of a terrorist offence as defined in Article 1 of Framework Decision 2002/475/JHA of 13 June 2002 on combating terrorism, or may it relate to participation in a terrorist group as referred to in Article 2 of that framework decision?

So far as terrorism is concerned, is the exclusion from international protection provided for in Article 12(2)(c) of Directive 2004/83/EC possible when there has been no commission or instigation of, or participation in, a violent act of a particularly cruel nature as referred to in Article 1 of Framework Decision 2002/475/JHA of 13 June 2002 on combating terrorism?

____________

____________

¹ OJ 2004 L 304, p. 12.

² OJ 2002 L 164, p. 3.