The European Affairs Ministers of the Member States, meeting in the General Affairs Council, held another three-hour discussion on Tuesday 20 April on the rule of law in the EU, based on the European Commission’s annual report (see EUROPE 12571/5), this time focusing on five Member States—France, Greece, Germany, Ireland and Spain.
The debate provided an opportunity to “take stock of positive good practices”, said Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders, and examples from which other countries can learn.
In particular, the Commissioner cited the good level of digitalisation of the Spanish justice system and the transparency of media ownership in Ireland, with a national media regulator making regular public reports.
In this discussion on how these states fight corruption, preserve the independence of the judiciary or protect the freedom of the press, we examined the way lobbies are regulated, the practice of ‘revolving doors’, the functioning of national councils of the judiciary or, as far as the press is concerned, the attacks on journalists, at a time when Greece is confronted with the murder of one of its most famous journalists.
According to one source, the discussion on France was the longest and raised more questions from other Member States, but the debate remained consensual and the comments relatively general. The shortest discussion was on Spain, which is experiencing a heated debate on its penal reform. The Commissioner commented on the Spanish debate and called for a balanced composition of the General Council of the Judiciary.
Poland
Poland was not on the agenda of this discussion. The day before, however, the International Federation for Human Rights had expressed its concern about the deteriorating situation in the country. It wrote a letter to the Portuguese Presidency of the EU Council on 19 April, urging it to react and organise an Article 7 hearing. The Presidency indicated that such an exercise would take place in May, if conditions allowed for an in-person meeting.
“In the two and a half years that have passed since the Council’s previous hearing on the rule of law in Poland, the Polish government has persisted in its attempts to undermine EU values and principles”, says the FIDH.
“We call on Portugal to ensure that the Council urgently addresses specific recommendations to the government of Poland in order to safeguard all the principles enshrined in Article 2 of the TEU and, based on the information provided, to support the need to determine that there is a clear risk of a serious breach of the values referred to in Article 2 of the TEU in Poland”.
Link to the letter: https://bit.ly/3xa1hJw (Original version in French by Solenn Paulic)