Luxembourg, 24/01/2005 (Agence Europe) - The former President of the European Court of Justice, Ole Due, died last Saturday at the age of 74. Before joining the Court, he worked for the Danish Ministry of Justice, where he was in charge of European issues at the time of Denmark's accession to the EEC in 1973. After a brief spell in the Danish magistracy, he was appointed judge at the European Court of Justice in November 1979, and was its President from 1988 to 1994. Ole Due was well-known and esteemed for his human qualities and abilities (he was juge rapporteur in 1983 in “co-insurance” cases, which are still considered ground-breaking in legal circles). Ole Due was then appointed Professor in European Law at the University of Copenhagen, and in 1999 chaired a focus group on reforms to be brought in at the Court ahead of the Intergovernmental Conference.