Appeal brought on 1 April 2011 by the European Commission against the judgment of the Civil Service Tribunal of 20 January 2011 in Case F-121/07 Strack v Commission

(Case T-197/11 P)

Language of the case: German

Parties

Appellant: European Commission (represented by P. Costa de Oliveira and B. Eggers, Agents)

Other party to the proceedings: Guido Strack (Cologne, Germany)

Form of order sought by the appellant

Set aside the judgment of the Civil Service Tribunal in Case F-121/07 Strack v Commission in so far as in that judgment the Civil Service Tribunal rejected the objection of lack of jurisdiction raised by the Commission;

Order each party to bear its own costs.

Pleas in law and main arguments

In support of the appeal, the appellant relies on the following plea in law.

Infringement of European Union law, and in particular the division of competences between the General Court and the Civil Service Tribunal as a specialised court as apparent from Article 270 TFEU read in conjunction with Article 91(1) of the Staff Regulations of Officials of the European Union, Article 8(3) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001, ¹ the first sentence of Article 256(1) TFEU and Article 62a and Article 1 of Annex 1 to the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union.

According to those provisions, the Civil Service Tribunal does not enjoy general jurisdiction in respect of all disputes between the European Union and any person to whom the Staff Regulations apply but only in respect of those disputes which concern the legality of an act which adversely affects such person within the meaning of Article 90(2) of the Staff Regulations.

Where an official submits an application for access to documents, he is acting as an ordinary citizen for the purposes of Regulation No 1049/2001. A specific system of remedies is available to him under the Regulation in the form of an action for annulment before the General Court. The system of remedies according to the Staff Regulations and the Transparency Regulation are purely and simply incompatible.

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¹ - Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents (OJ 2001 L 145, p. 43).