Judgment of the Court (Second Chamber) of 8 July 2010 - European Commission v Italian Republic
(Failure of a Member State to fulfil obligations - Union's own resources - Refusal to make available to the Union own resources corresponding to certain unlawful customs authorisations - Force majeure - Fraudulent conduct by the customs authorities - Liability of the Member States - Lawfulness of the entry of established entitlements in a separate account)
Language of the case: Italian
Parties
Applicant: European Commission (represented by: A. Aresu and A. Caeiros, acting as Agents)
Defendant: Italian Republic (represented by: I. Bruni, acting as Agent, assisted by G. Albenzio, avvocato dello Stato)
Intervener in support of the defendant: Federal Republic of Germany (represented by M. Lumma and B. Klein, acting as Agents)
Re:
Failure of a Member State to fulfil obligations - Infringement of Article 10 EC, Article 8 of Council Decision 2000/597/EC, Euratom of 29 September 2000 on the system of the European Communities' own resources (OJ 2000 L 253, p. 42), and Articles 2, 6, 10, 11 and 17 of the Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) of 22 May 2000 implementing Decision 94/728/EC, Euratom on the system of the Communities' own resources (OJ 2000 L 130, p. 11) - Refusal to make available to the Communities the own resources corresponding to certain irregular customs authorisations
Operative part of the judgment
The Court:
1. Declares that, by refusing to place at the disposal of the Commission the own resources corresponding to the customs debt deriving from the issue by the Direzione Compartimentale delle Dogane per le Regioni Puglia e Basilicata, located in Bari, as from 27 February 1997, of irregular authorisations to create and operate Type C customs bonded warehouses in Taranto, followed by consecutive authorisations for processing under customs control and to use the inward processing procedure, until their revocation on 4 December 2002, the Italian Republic has failed to fulfil its obligations under Article 8 of Council Decision 2000/597/EC, Euratom of 29 September 2000 on the system of the European Communities' own resources and Articles 2, 6, 10, 11 and 17 of Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 1150/2000 of 22 May 2000 implementing Decision 94/728/EC, Euratom on the system of the Communities' own resources;
2. Orders the Italian Republic to pay the costs;
3. Orders the Federal Republic of Germany to bear its own costs.
____________1 - OJ C 223, 30.08.2008.