Luxembourg, 10/11/2004 (Agence Europe) - Two Danish TV channels, TV Danmark and Kanal 5 Denmark, are calling for annulment of the European Commission ruling that aid granted in 1995 and 2002 to the public Danish TV channel TV2 are compatible with the single market (see yesterday's Europe, p.14), and Denmark is also challenging the decision at the European Court of First Instance.
Denmark is challenging the fact that in its decision, the European Commission decided that 628.2 million Danish crowns worth of aid to TV2 is illegal and must be recovered (see yesterday's Europe, p.14).
The Danish government believes that neither the aid paid to TV2 nor the advertising income paid to TV2 via TV2-Fonden until TV2-Funden was wound up in 1997 amounts to state since it is not state resources under Article 87 of the EC Treaty. Moreover, the size of the aid was reasonable since TV2 has public service commitments. The aid therefore does not amount to overpayment and cannot be considered state aid.
Finally, Denmark argues that even if it is argued that state resources were paid to TV2, the transfer would meet the private investor criteria for a market economy and would for this reason not be state aid.
Since June 2004, all appeals by Member States for annulment of a decision by the European Commission are first considered by the European Court of First Instance. In the past, the European Court of Justice had sole competence for such cases.