ORDER OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE COURT
10 September 2019 (*)
(Appeal — Intervention — Joinder at first instance — Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union — Article 40 — Interest in the result of the case — Dismissal)
In Joined Cases C‑597/18 P, C‑598/18 P, C‑603/18 P and C‑604/18 P,
FOUR APPEALS under Article 56 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union, brought on 21 September 2018 (Cases C‑597/18 and C‑598/18) and 24 September 2018 (Cases C‑603/18 and C‑604/18), respectively,
Council of the European Union, represented by A. de Gregorio Merino, I. Gurov and E. Chatziioakeimidou, acting as Agents (C‑597/18 P and C‑598/18 P),
appellant,
supported by:
Republic of Finland, represented by S. Hartikainen and J. Heliskoski, acting as Agents,
intervener in the appeal,
the other parties to the proceedings being:
Dr K. Chrysostomides & Co. LLC, established in Nicosia (Cyprus), and others, represented by P. Tridimas, Barrister (C‑597/18 P),
Eleni Pavlikka Bourdouvali, residing in Meneou (Cyprus), and others, represented by P. Tridimas, Barrister, and K. Chrysostomides, dikigoros (C‑598/18 P),
applicants at first instance,
European Union, represented by the European Commission,
Council of the European Union, represented by E. Chatziioakeimidou, A. de Gregorio Merino and I. Gurov, acting as Agents,
European Commission, represented by L. Flynn, J.‑P. Keppenne and T. Maxian Rusche, acting as Agents,
European Central Bank (ECB), represented by M. Szablewska and K. Laurinavičius, acting as Agents, and by H.‑G. Kamann, Rechtsanwalt,
Eurogroup, represented by the Council of the European Union,
defendants at first instance,
and
Dr K. Chrysostomides & Co. LLC, established in Nicosia, and others, represented by P. Tridimas, Barrister (C‑603/18 P),
appellants,
the other parties to the proceedings being:
European Union, represented by the European Commission,
Council of the European Union, represented by E. Chatziioakeimidou, A. de Gregorio Merino and I. Gurov, acting as Agents,
European Commission, represented by L. Flynn, J.‑P. Keppenne and T. Maxian Rusche, acting as Agents,
European Central Bank (ECB), represented by M. Szablewska and K. Laurinavičius, acting as Agents, and by H.‑G. Kamann, Rechtsanwalt,
Eurogroup, represented by the Council of the European Union,
defendants at first instance,
Republic of Finland, represented by S. Hartikainen and J. Heliskoski, acting as Agents,
intervener in the appeal,
and
Eleni Pavlikka Bourdouvali, residing in Meneou, and others, represented by P. Tridimas, Barrister, and K. Chrysostomides, dikigoros (C‑604/18 P),
appellants,
the other parties to the proceedings being:
European Union, represented by the European Commission,
Council of the European Union, represented by E. Chatziioakeimidou, A. de Gregorio Merino and I. Gurov, acting as Agents,
European Commission, represented by L. Flynn, J.‑P. Keppenne and T. Maxian Rusche, acting as Agents,
European Central Bank (ECB), represented by M. Szablewska and K. Laurinavičius, acting as Agents, and by H.‑G. Kamann, Rechtsanwalt,
Eurogroup, represented by the Council of the European Union,
defendants at first instance,
Republic of Finland, represented by S. Hartikainen and J. Heliskoski, acting as Agents,
intervener in the appeal,
THE PRESIDENT OF THE COURT
having regard to the proposal of A. Arabadjiev, Judge-Rapporteur,
after hearing the Advocate General, G. Pitruzzella,
makes the following
Order
1 By their appeals, the Council of the European Union (C‑597/18 P and C‑598/18 P), Dr K. Chrysostomides & Co. LLC and others (C‑603/18 P) and Ms Eleni Pavlikka Bourdouvali and others (C‑604/18 P) seek:
– in Cases C‑597/18 P and C‑598/18 P, to have set aside the judgments of the General Court of the European Union of 13 July 2018, K. Chrysostomides & Co. and Others v Council and Others (T‑680/13, EU:T:2018:486; ‘the judgment under appeal in T‑680/13’), and of 13 July 2018, Bourdouvali and Others v Council and Others (T‑786/14, not published, EU:T:2018:487; ‘the judgment under appeal in T‑786/14’), in so far as they dismiss the plea of inadmissibility raised by the Council concerning the Eurogroup;
– in Case C‑603/18 P, to have set aside the judgment under appeal in T‑680/13, and
– in Case C‑604/18 P, to have set aside the judgment under appeal in T‑786/14,
by which the General Court dismissed the actions brought by Dr K. Chrysostomides & Co. and others and by Ms Pavlikka Bourdouvali and others, seeking compensation for damage allegedly suffered by them as a result of the decision of the Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) of 21 March 2013 relating to emergency liquidity assistance following a request from the Central Bank of Cyprus, the Eurogroup Statements of 25 March, 12 April, 13 May and 13 September 2013 concerning Cyprus, Council Decision 2013/236/EU of 25 April 2013 addressed to Cyprus on specific measures to restore financial stability and sustainable growth (OJ 2013 L 141, p. 32), the Memorandum of Understanding of 26 April 2013 on Specific Economic Policy Conditionality concluded between the Republic of Cyprus and the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), and other acts and conduct of the European Commission, the Council, the ECB and the Eurogroup connected with the grant of a financial assistance facility to the Republic of Cyprus (‘the contested acts’).
2 By its cross-appeal in Cases C‑603/18 P and C‑604/18 P, the Council seeks to have set aside the judgments under appeal in T‑680/13 and T‑786/14 in so far as the General Court dismissed the plea of inadmissibility raised by the Council.
3 By decision of the President of the Court of 5 September 2019, Cases C‑597/18 P, C‑598/18 P, C‑603/18 P and C‑604/18 P were joined.
4 By documents lodged at the Court Registry on 27 December 2018 and 7 January 2019, Mr Georgios Theodorakis and Mrs Maria Theodoraki, Berry Investments INC and Mr Georgios Legakis and others, on the earlier date, and Ms Maria Amira and others, on the later date (‘the applicants to intervene’), each applied, on the basis of the second paragraph of Article 40 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union, for leave to intervene in Joined Cases C‑597/18 P, C‑598/18 P, C‑603/18 P and C‑604/18 P, in support of the forms of order sought by the applicants at first instance.
5 By letter dated 7 January 2019, the Court invited the Commission, the ECB and the Council to submit their observations on those four applications to intervene.
The application to intervene
6 In support of their applications, Mr Theodorakis and Mrs Theodoraki, Berry Investments, Mr Legakis and others and Ms Amira and others state that they have each brought before the General Court an action for damages against the defendants at first instance, registered under numbers T‑495/14, T‑496/14, T‑765/14 and T‑868/16, respectively. They point out that they have relied on the same grounds as those advanced by the applicants in the cases giving rise to the judgments under appeal in T‑680/13 and T‑786/14. Those applicants submitted, in essence, that, by the contested acts, the defendants at first instance obliged the Republic of Cyprus to adopt measures which caused the applicants financial damage. They maintained that those measures were the source of the financial losses which they suffered in their capacity as shareholders or depositors of the banks concerned and should be regarded as having been caused by the institutions, bodies, offices or agencies of the European Union or by their servants in the performance of their duties.
7 The applicants to intervene point out that Cases T‑495/14, T‑496/14, T‑765/14 and T‑868/16, which have been stayed before the General Court, were considered by that court to be connected with Cases T‑786/14 and T‑680/13, which were classified as ‘pilot’ cases.
8 The applicants to intervene submit that, as a result of that connection, they have an interest in intervening in the present cases concerning the judgments under appeal in T‑786/14 and T‑680/13 since the judgments that will be delivered by the Court of Justice in those ‘pilot’ cases will have a direct effect on their legal position. The Court of Justice will be deciding the point of law on which the outcome in Cases T‑495/14, T‑496/14, T‑765/14 and T‑868/16 turns, as the General Court is bound by the Court of Justice’s interpretation.
9 The applicants to intervene also submit that, while they would be entitled to bring an appeal against the decisions of the General Court that will be delivered in Cases T‑495/14, T‑496/14, T‑765/14 and T‑868/16 following the judgments of the Court of Justice in the present cases, their actions for damages brought before the General Court will be dismissed on the ground that the legal issues raised in their respective cases are identical to those on which the Court of Justice will have ruled in the present cases.
10 Under the second paragraph of Article 40 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union, any person who can establish an interest in the result of a case submitted to the Court, other than a case between Member States, between institutions of the European Union or between Member States and institutions, is entitled to intervene in that case.
11 Furthermore, according to the Court’s settled case-law, the concept of an ‘interest in the result of a case’, within the meaning of that provision, must be defined in the light of the subject matter of the dispute and be understood as meaning a direct, existing interest in the ruling on the forms of order sought, and not as an interest in relation to the pleas in law or arguments put forward. The words ‘result of a case’ refer to the final decision sought, as set out in the operative part of the future judgment or order (order of the President of the Court of 27 February 2019, Uniwersytet Wrocławski and Poland v REA, C‑515/17 P and C‑561/17 P, not published, EU:C:2019:174, paragraph 7 and the case-law cited).
12 It is therefore necessary to ascertain whether the applicant to intervene has a direct and existing interest in the result of the case. In principle, an interest in the result of the case can be considered sufficiently direct only in so far as that result is capable of altering the legal position of the applicant to intervene (order of the Vice-President of the Court of 17 May 2018, United States of America v Apple Sales International and Others, C‑12/18 P(I), not published, EU:C:2018:330, paragraph 8 and the case-law cited).
13 Furthermore, it is necessary to distinguish between applicants to intervene who can establish a direct interest in the ruling on the forms of order sought by the parties to the dispute in which they wish to intervene and those who can establish only an indirect interest in the result of the case by reason of similarities between their situation and that of one of the parties (see, to that effect, order of the President of the Court of 29 July 2019, Commission v Carreras Sequeros and Others, C‑119/19 P, not published, EU:C:2019:658, paragraph 12 and the case-law cited).
14 In the present case, it must be noted that the damage for which the applicants to intervene seek compensation in the actions for damages brought before the General Court differs from the damage suffered by the appellants in the present cases. The applications to intervene are brought by natural and legal persons whose interest consists in defending their own position, which, although comparable to that of the appellants, is nevertheless distinct, in fact and in law, since the damage for which they seek compensation by virtue of the rights which they assert is particular to them.
15 Furthermore, any person who is in a similar situation to that of the appellants could claim that he has an interest in intervening in a case concerning an action for damages brought by other persons. However, if a person had to be granted leave to intervene in every case in which another person in a similar situation is a party and which may result in a judgment the grounds of which could have an effect on how his own position is assessed, it would become difficult, impossible even, to determine when an interest in intervening exists.
16 In the present case, however, it is apparent from the arguments put forward by the applicants to intervene that their alleged interest relates solely to the Court’s reasoning on the points of law raised in the present cases, and not to the result of those cases as such. Such an interest is not sufficient to establish the existence of a right to intervene in accordance with the case-law referred to in paragraph 12 of this order.
17 It must therefore be held that, since the judgment that will be given by the Court on the appeals will have no direct bearing on the actions for damages which the applicants to intervene have brought before the General Court, the applicants to intervene have no direct interest in the result of the case.
18 Moreover, the purpose of the right to intervene in proceedings before the Court is to allow applicants with an interest in the result of a case to set out their arguments. The right of applicants to intervene to assert their rights and to set out their arguments — which flows from Article 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union and, in particular, from the guarantees inherent in the right to an effective remedy enshrined in that provision — is guaranteed by virtue of their being parties to proceedings pending before, and not yet examined by, the General Court.
19 That finding is not called into question in the present case by the designation of Cases T‑680/13 and T‑786/14 as ‘pilot’ cases by the General Court, which decided to stay the proceedings currently pending before it in Cases T‑495/14, T‑496/14, T‑765/14 and T‑868/16. The aim of those decisions to designate ‘pilot’ cases and to stay proceedings, which were made on the basis of Article 69(d) of the Rules of Procedure of the General Court, was to facilitate the handling of the cases in the interests of the proper administration of justice. However, that objective would be undermined and the very principle of the designation of pilot cases disregarded if the applicants in the stayed cases were granted, simply by virtue of that status, leave to intervene in the appeal proceedings.
20 It follows that the applicants to intervene have not established a direct and existing interest in the result of the present cases.
21 Consequently, the applications to intervene made by the applicants to intervene must be dismissed.
Costs
22 Under Article 138(1) of the Rules of Procedure, which applies to appeal proceedings by virtue of Article 184(1) thereof, the unsuccessful party is to be ordered to pay the costs if they have been applied for in the successful party’s pleadings. Since the Commission and the ECB have applied for costs to be awarded against the applicants to intervene and the applicants to intervene have been unsuccessful, they must be ordered to bear their own costs and to pay those incurred by the Commission and the ECB in the present proceedings. The Council shall bear its own costs.
On those grounds, the Court hereby orders:
1. The applications to intervene made by Mr Georgios Theodorakis and Mrs Maria Theodoraki, Berry Investments INC, Mr Georgios Legakis and others and Ms Maria Amira and others are dismissed.
2. Mr Georgios Theodorakis and Mrs Maria Theodoraki, Berry Investment INC, Mr Georgios Legakis and others and Ms Maria Amira and others shall bear their own costs and pay those incurred by the European Commission and the European Central Bank (ECB).
3. The Council of the European Union shall bear its own costs.
Luxembourg, 10 September 2019.
A. Calot Escobar | | K. Lenaerts |