Case C-125/06 P

Commission of the European Communities

v

Infront WM AG

(Appeal – Directive 89/552/EEC – Television broadcasting – Action for annulment – Fourth paragraph of Article 230 EC – Meaning of decision of ‘direct and individual’ concern to a natural or legal person)

Summary of the Judgment

1.        Actions for annulment – Natural or legal persons – Measures of direct and individual concern to them

(Art. 230, fourth para., EC; Council Directive 89/552, Art. 3a)

2.        Actions for annulment – Natural or legal persons – Measures of direct and individual concern to them

(Art. 230, fourth para., EC)

1.        Measures aimed at regulating the exercise of exclusive television broadcasting rights to events of major importance for society, adopted by a Member State and approved by a Commission decision finding them to be compatible with Community law, impose certain restrictions on television broadcasters. Since those restrictions are linked to the circumstances in which those broadcasters acquire the television broadcasting rights to designated events from the holder of the exclusive television rights, the effect of the measures adopted by that Member State and of the decision approving them is to subject the rights held by a company which has acquired the television broadcasting rights to new restrictions which did not exist when it acquired those rights and which render their exercise more difficult. Thus, such a Commission decision directly affects the legal situation of the holder of those rights. Moreover, the prejudice to that right-holder’s legal situation is due solely to the requirement to attain the result determined by those measures and the Commission decision, without the national authorities having any discretion, which could affect that situation, in the implementation of that decision.

(see paras 50-52, 59, 62-63)

2.        Persons other than those to whom a decision is addressed may claim to be individually concerned only if that decision affects them by reason of certain attributes which are peculiar to them or by reason of circumstances in which they are differentiated from all other persons and by virtue of these factors distinguishes them individually just as in the case of the person addressed by such a decision. In that regard, where the decision affects a group of persons who were identified or identifiable when that measure was adopted by reason of criteria specific to the members of the group, those persons might be individually concerned by that measure inasmuch as they form part of a limited class of traders. That can be the case particularly when the decision alters rights acquired by the individual prior to its adoption.

(see paras 70-72)