Croatia and Slovenia are being referred to the EU Court of Justice for a second time, each for failing to comply with a Court judgment on waste pollution, and face heavy fines for failing to meet the requirements of the Waste Framework Directive (Directive 2008/98/EU), the European Commission announced on Wednesday 15 February.
Croatia has failed to comply with a judgment of 2 May 2019 that condemned it for the illegal Biljane Donje landfill, where some 140,000 tonnes of production residues from ferromanganese and silicomanganese processing have been deposited since 2010, less than 50 metres away from homes.
In order to comply with this judgment, Croatia was obliged to either close the illegal landfill or to renovate it as soon as possible. However, more than 3 years later, the Member State being prosecuted has not taken any tangible action: the abandoned waste is creating health and environmental risks and it is not known how the waste will be disposed of or when the site will be cleaned up.
Slovenia, meanwhile, has not fully complied with a Court judgment of 16 July 2015 that found it in breach of both the Framework Directive and Directive 1999/31/EU on the landfill of waste.
The cause: two illegal landfills, one in the Gaberje-jug business park and the other in Bukovžlak (both located near the former Zync factory in Celje). The former was renovated in 2015 and the site is now in compliance with EU rules, but no renovation work has yet started for the Bukovžlak landfill.
In both the Croatian and Slovenian cases, the second referral to the Court may result in financial penalties for the time between the first judgment and full compliance. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)