The 4th inter-institutional negotiating session and the last one under the Estonian Presidency of the Council of the EU - on the reform of the governance model for Eurojust - on 12 December in Strasbourg, was not enough to overcome all the remaining stumbling blocks. This will leave the Bulgarian Presidency in the first half of 2018 the responsibility of continuing and perhaps concluding the negotiations.
According to one European source close to the dossier, several areas of progress were made during this trialogue, including a permanent agreement on Eurojust’s remit and that of its national members. The institutions effectively agreed that a national member of Eurojust cannot issue or implement international requests for legal cooperation unless the agreement has been obtained of the national authority responsible conducting the internal procedure.
In terms of information exchange, the European Parliament and the Council of the EU also ratified the obligation incumbent on member states to inform Eurojust of all cross-border procedures involving at least three countries. The Eurojust Agency would be obliged to provide notification exclusively in cases involving two-member states or involving a complex procedure.
According to this same source, the European Parliament also decided, “in a surprising way” to reopen the compromise provision reached during the previous trialogues on the election of the presidents and vice presidents of Eurojust. The normal procedure stipulates that the Eurojust College elects the president and vice president from among the national members by a two thirds majority of all its members.
In this regard, the institutions agreed that in cases where a two thirds majority cannot be reached after a second round of elections, the election can take place by simple majority of its members. At the end of this trialogue, it would appear that the European Parliament considers that the majority of two thirds reflects a stronger and larger mandate the representatives.
The participation of the European Commission at the Eurojust College, as well as the question of data protection, with regard to the ongoing trilogies on the revision of the regulation (45/2001) on the processing of personal data by the EU institutions and bodies, therefore is still pending. (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)