A potential difference in treatment between a non-EU citizen who is a victim of violence by an EU spouse and a non-EU citizen legally resident in the EU who is a victim of the same violence by a spouse from a third country does not violate equality in law, the Court of Justice ruled on 2 September.
In a preliminary judgment (Case C-930/19 Belgian State), it stressed that a third-country national who is the victim of domestic violence committed by their spouse, an EU citizen, is not in a situation comparable to that of a third-country national who is the victim of domestic violence committed by their spouse, who is a third-country national.
In so doing, the Court has answered a question put to it by the Belgian Council for asylum and immigration proceedings, following an appeal by an Algerian national, X, a legal resident of the EU, against a Belgian decision to terminate his right of residence.
In 2012, X joined his French wife in Belgium, where he was issued a residence card as a family member of an EU citizen. In 2015, he was forced to leave the marital home due to domestic violence by his wife. A few months later, the latter left Belgium to settle in France.
The divorce filed by X was pronounced on 24 July 2018. In the meantime, the Belgian State had terminated X’s right of residence on the grounds that he had failed to prove that he had sufficient resources to support himself. This judgment relied on the Belgian provisions transposing Article 13(2) of Directive 2004/38/EC on the right of citizens of the Union and their family members to move and reside freely within the territory of the Member States.
X lodged an appeal against this decision before the Council for asylum and immigration proceedings on the grounds that there is an unjustified difference in treatment between the spouse of an EU citizen and that of a third-country national legally residing in Belgium.
The Belgian Council for asylum and immigration proceedings considers that, with regard to the conditions for maintaining the right of residence of third-country nationals who have been victims of domestic violence by their spouse in the event of divorce, the regime established by Directive 2004/38/EC is less favourable than that established by Directive 2003/86 on family reunification.
It therefore asked the Court about the validity of Article 13(2) of Directive 2004/38/EC, in particular with regard to the principle of equal treatment provided for in Article 20 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. See the judgment: https://bit.ly/3l53IIr (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)