15.6.2020

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 201/4

(Case C-859/19)

(2020/C 201/06)

Language of the case: Romanian

Referring court

Defendants

Other party to the proceedings

Parchetul de pe lângă Înalta Curte de Casaţie și Justiție — Direcţia Naţională Anticorupţie

Questions referred

1.Are Article 19(1) of the Treaty on European Union, Article 325(1) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, Article 58 of Directive (EU) 2015/849 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 May 2015 on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purposes of money laundering or terrorist financing, amending Regulation (EU) No 648/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council, and repealing Directive 2005/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council and Commission Directive 2006/70/EC, (and) Article 4 of Directive (EU) 2017/1371 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 5 July 2017 on the fight against fraud to the Union’s financial interests by means of criminal law, (which was) adopted on the basis of Article 83(2) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (and which replaced the Convention) on the protection of the European Communities’ financial interests of 26 July 1995, to be interpreted as precluding the adoption of a decision by a body outside the judiciary — the Curtea Constituțională a României (Constitutional Court of Romania) — which requires corruption cases decided within a specified period and currently at the appeal stage to be referred back to the court of first instance for re-examination on the ground that there has been a failure to establish, at the level of the supreme court, panels hearing cases specialising in that field, although it recognises the specialisation of the judges of which those panels were composed?

2.Are Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union and [the second paragraph of] Article 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union to be interpreted as precluding a body outside the judiciary from finding that the composition of panels hearing cases within a chamber of the supreme court (panels composed of serving judges who, at the time of their promotion, satisfied, inter alia, the specialisation condition required for promotion to the Criminal Chamber of the supreme court) is unlawful?

3.Is the primacy of EU law to be interpreted as permitting a national court to disapply a decision of the constitutional court which has been handed down in a case concerning a constitutional dispute and is binding under national law?

(1) OJ 2015 L 141, p. 73.

(2) OJ 2017 L 198, p. 29.