Court gives blow to EU foreign policy

The General Court  of the European Union has decided to annul the freezing of the assets of five Ukrainians, including two former Prime Ministers.

The General Court writes in a press release that the Council, in response to the crisis in Ukraine - which began at the end of 2013 - decided, on 5 March 2014, to freeze the assets and economic resources of the persons identified as responsible for the misappropriation of Ukrainian State funds. Two former Prime Ministers together with three other Ukrainians were, for the period from 6 March 2014 to 5 March 2015, included on the list of persons subject to the freezing of assets on the ground that they were the subject of preliminary investigations in Ukraine relating to offences connected to misappropriation of Ukrainian State funds and their illegal transfer outside Ukraine. The five Ukrainians brought proceedings before the General Court with a view to having their inclusion on the list annulled.

In today´s judgments the General Court upholds the actions brought by the five Ukrainians and annul the freezing of assets imposed on them for the period from 6 March 2014 to 5 March 2015.

The Court finds that the Council identified the five Ukrainians as being responsible for misappropriation of funds solely on the basis of a letter from the Prosecutor General of Ukraine stating that investigations of those persons had made it possible to establish that large amounts of public funds had been misappropriated and unlawfully transferred out of Ukraine. The Court takes the view that that letter provides no deatils concerning the matters specifically alleged against the five Ukrainians of the nature of their responsiblity. In short the Court concludes that a person cannot be treated as being responsible for misappropriation of funds solely on the ground that he is the subject of a preliminary investigation in a third country, without the Council being aware of the matters alleged against that person in that investigation.

EU reforms - in which direction ?

The European integration process, which started after the second world war, has aimed at preventing dangerous nationalism and instead make Europe stronger as a whole. Mixed results make it difficult to say if the cooperation has been a success or a failure. With "an ever closer union" as a wizard, the EU has met every problem with a call for "more Europe". That is also the situation to day. The Union wants more power to handle the Euro and migration crises.

But there is now a growing resistance in the member states to cede more sovereignty to Brussels. Nationalism has got a strong come back. The EU is now at an important crossroad. Reforms are needed, but should they consist of more or less Europe ? The answer to this will come through political struggle. Two perspectives on the integration reform has recently been presented.

Guy Verhofstadt, leader for the Alliance of Liberal and Democrats for Europe group in the European Praliament, proposes to create a system of two types of European membership: The first type is "full membership" that goes all the way. It makes you part of the "ever closer union" with one currency, one economic policy, one army and one foreign policy. Those European countries who think full membership is not their cup of tea, can apply for a second type: "associate membership". This gives access to to the internal market, you will only have to apply those rules and regulations that are necessary to create a level playing field in internal trade. Obviously, that also means you would no longer have full representation and the corresponding voting rights at EU level.

Former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis has said he will launch a "third alternative" to "renationalisation" and the "antidemocratic European institutions" on 9 February 2016 in Berlin. The initiative, under the name of "Democracy in Europe Movement 2025 (DiE25) wants to bring interests together in order to "democratize Europe and stop the creeping fragmentation".

The two perspectives are interesting, but it seems unclear if they can provide adequate responses to the challenges.