Month: July 2021

An instrument out of tune: the EU –Mercosur Trade Agreement

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Nataly Machado (Master’s student in EU Law, UMinho)
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Brazil is one of the countries with the largest environmental heritage in the world. However, in breach of the existing legislation that helps protect the environment, Brazilian biomes are increasingly threatened by the poor political and environmental management of this country in recent years.

If we consider the Amazon biome, the largest tropical forest in the world, which occupies 59% of Brazil’s territory, holds a large part of the available freshwater in the world and is home to the largest number of species of flora and fauna in the world, the numbers of environmental setbacks are alarming (to say the least). For example, in April 2021, record shows that deforestation reached 778 km2, which is the highest rate for that month in the last ten years[1].

The gap between the discourse of goals and commitments to take care of the Brazilian forests and what happens in practice – an old and repeated script in the history of unbridled destruction of the Amazon – has not worked as a strategy to consolidate the trade agreement between the European Union and Mercosur (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay), which has been the breeding ground for controversy before the final approval of the EU Member States and the European Parliament.

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The Schrems II Judgment: First two investigations by the European Data Protection Supervisor

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by Joana Campos e Matos (Senior Consultant at Vieira de Almeida & Associados)
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On May 27, 2021, the European Data Protection Supervisor (“EDPS”) announced that it has opened two investigations regarding the use of Amazon and Microsoft services by European Union institutions (EUIs)[1].

In a press release, the EDPS announced the opening of two investigations, one concerning the use of cloud services provided by Amazon Web Services and Microsoft under Cloud II contracts by European Union institutions, bodies and agencies and the other regarding the use of Microsoft Office 365 by the European Commission.

The EDPS underlined that these investigations are part of the EDPS’ strategy for EU institutions to comply with the “Schrems II” Judgement[2].

1. Legal framework for international data transfers by EUIs

According to the Regulation (EU) 2018/1725 [3], international data transfers[4] are only permitted if the third country to which the data are transferred, ensures that the conditions set out in the Regulation are respected, in such a way that the level of protection of natural persons guaranteed by the Regulation is not undermined (Article 46). Thus, data transfers to countries located outside the European Economic Area (“EEA”) can only occur within the strict terms provided for by the Regulation.

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Summaries of judgments: Repubblika v Il-Prim Ministru | Asociaţia «Forumul Judecătorilor din România» and Others

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Summaries of judgments made in collaboration with the Portuguese judge and référendaire of the CJEU (Nuno Piçarra and Sophie Perez)

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Judgment of the Court (Grand Chamber) of 20 April 2021, Repubblika v Il-Prim Ministru, Case C-896/19, EU:C:2021:311

Reference for a preliminary ruling – Article 2 TEU – Values of the European Union – Rule of law – Article 49 TEU – Accession to the European Union – No reduction in the level of protection of the values of the European Union – Effective judicial protection – Article 19 TEU – Article 47 CFREU – Scope – Independence of the members of the judiciary of a Member State – Appointments procedure – Power of the Prime Minister – Involvement of a judicial appointments committee

1. Facts

Following the appointment, in April 2019, of new members of the judiciary, Repubblika – an association whose purpose is to promote the protection of justice and the rule of law in Malta – brought an actio popularis before the Prim’Awla tal-Qorti Ċivili – Ġurisdizzjoni Kostituzzjonali (First Hall of the Civil Court, sitting as a Constitutional Court, Malta), with a view, in particular, to seek a declaration that, by reason of the existing system for the appointment of members of the judiciary, as governed by the Constitution, the Republic of Malta is in breach of its obligations under, inter alia, the combined provisions of the second subparagraph of Article 19(1) TEU and of Article 47 CFREU. The constitutional provisions concerned, which had remained unchanged from the time of their adoption in 1964 until a reform in 2016, confer on Il-Prim Ministru (Prime Minister, Malta) the power to submit to the President of the Republic the appointment of a candidate to such office. The candidates must satisfy certain conditions, also laid down by the Constitution, and, since the 2016 reform, a Judicial Appointments Committee has been established, which is charged with assessing candidates and providing an opinion to the Prime Minister. However, Repubblika challenges the conformity of national constitutional provisions concerning the procedure for the appointment of members of the Maltese judiciary with, in particular, the requirements laid down by EU law for the independence of the judicial system of the Member States.

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Editorial of July 2021

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By Carlos Abreu Amorim (Professor of Administrative and Environmental Law, UMinho)
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European Climate Law – the point of non-return of environmental protection

There are a number of reasons for how significant the European Climate Law (ECL), the final text of which was adopted in May 2021 should be considered. It is not only because it is the first binding legal instrument to come from the European Green Deal (EGD). Not even because of its primary intention: to convert this environmental plan launched by the Commission of Ursula von der Leyen in December 2019 into a fundamental European plan of energy decarbonisation targets and mandatory commitments with the intention of transforming the generality of production processes on the path of climate neutrality.

Even more than the reasons mentioned in previous paragraph, the success of the ECL has now become a sine qua non test for the European Union’s integration project.

European integration has increasing economic, political, geostrategic, ambitions for social achievement and full rights for its citizens. A wide range of purposes and effective peace, happiness and welfare have been achieved like never before in history. Likewise, its path of undisputed success has also seen some setbacks in these and other areas. Nevertheless, more than ever, the scale of the climate emergency and the essential responses that the environmental quality of the planet today requires in terms of public policies clearly outweigh the limited unit of account provided by the unique action of States (even countries that are large in power, population and territory). If it was already a settled truth that there are no nations capable of competing or even subsisting on their own, the deterioration of the planet’s environmental status has raised the need for extended common projects in pursuing sustainable and efficient environmental public policies. Environmental protection is one of the areas of public policies where the natural shortcomings of actions carried out alone within the framework of the old logic of the Nation State are most noted and where the broad integration of these public policies is most necessary. Climate changes will not be able to be fought with success through reactive pipelines, targeted solutions or disunited strategies. Unilateral actions will also not succeed, not even the best designed ones. The urgency of climate responses implies firm resolutions, consistency in the ends, breadth and cross-cutting and supranational scope in public policies. Above all, it requires political choices with a degree of permanence that will only be possible if there is a political consensus and the sharing of these concerns by much of the public.

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