The EU Court of Justice (TJUE) has held the view on the preliminary ruling of the amnesty that will establish the lace in the EU right of criminal oblivion to the cases of embezzlement and terrorism. The first part of the day has developed around the case that affects the Court of Accounts and in the afternoon it has touched the turn of the questions elevated by the National Court regarding forgiveness to the CDR. The Prosecutor's Office, the State Advocacy and the lawyers of the defendants have joined forces in their defense of the norm against the complainants of Catalan civil society, who see the amnesty with European norms incompatible. For its part, the European Commission has questioned the two -month period that the law gives to apply the amnesty as well as the “general interest” behind the regulations, although it rejects the fundamental element for which the matter has reached Luxembourg by denying that the process will affect the economic interests of the EU.
“It does not seem that the Organic Law of Amnesty (LOA) effectively responds to a objective of general interest given that it is part of a political agreement to achieve the investiture of the Government of Spain,” said the representative of the European Commission, Carlos Urraca Caviedes, which also doubts that the Spanish authorities attended “to the recommendations of the Venice Commission that the necessary time would be taken to carry out a significant dialogue invoked from reconciliation. ” In that sense, censorship that was processed by the emergency route and has recriminated that there were no reports of independent organizations.
The state lawyer has specified that urgent processing does not eliminate the presentation of mandatory reports (which are only required when the initiative starts from the Council of Ministers) but is limited to shortening the deadlines. “All the procedures of that procedure were fulfilled,” said lawyer by remembering that the proposal was presented by the PSOE in Congress.
“A deep and virulent division”
Against the main political argument of Pedro Sánchez to justify the amnesty, which is based on the coexistence and resolution of the political conflict in Catalonia, the European Commission points to “a deep and virulent division in the political class, in the institutions, in the judicial world, in the academic world and in Spanish society”. The right even brought to Brussels his offensive against amnesty.
“The Spanish authorities did not attend to the recommendations of the Venice Commission that the necessary time to carry out a significant dialogue was taken, with a spirit of loyal cooperation between the state institutions, as well as between the majority and the opposition, in order to achieve the invoked social and political reconciliation,” reiterated the lawyer in line with what the community executive already reflected in his observations in writing.
“There are doubts about the requirement that the provisions of the LOA are clear and precise,” added the lawyer that, however, has recognized that determining it would correspond to the Court of Auditors, which has raised preliments within the framework of the alleged embezzlement that affects 33 high positions, including Carles Puigdemont, Oriol Junqueras or Artur Mas.
The Prosecutor's Office defends the political negotiation of the amnesty
For its part, the Prosecutor's Office recalled that the normal thing is that amnesty processes are negotiated politically. The prosecutor has also rejected the concept of “autoamnesty” that the European Commission introduced into their written allegations and that the European Commission agent has reiterated. “If there is support to consider that the autoamnegies in which whoever holds political power intends to shield, guaranteeing their legal immunity, are contrary to the principle of the rule of law; in the opinion of the commission, the same criteria should apply when who is in the government guarantees the impunity of their partners in exchange for parliamentary support,” said Caviedes in reference to the law, which was born of the negotiation of the negotiation of the negotiation of the negotiation of the law, which was born in reference to the law. and ERC in exchange for your support for Sánchez's investiture.
The State Advocacy, which represents the Government, recalled that the rule followed the corresponding parliamentary process and has assured that “a self -love” cannot be considered in any case. ” “In principle, a law debated and approved by the Parliament of a democratic state of law that contemplates the extinction of criminal responsibility for amnesty cannot be described as self -love,” he said.
However, the emphasis of his defense has given him that the amnesty is not a damage to the EU economic interests that, as the representative, Andrea Gavela Llopis recalled, is the only assumption that the TJUE could reject it.
The State Advocacy and the Prosecutor's Office, which have clung to the endorsement of the Constitutional Court, have recalled that judicial procedures in Spain did not point in that direction at any time. The representative of the Public Ministry, Manuel Martín-Granizo, has assured that the matter was only raised once the law had been approved.
Nor is the European commission damage to the interests of the EU. “It does not seem that the decrease in the gross national income of a member state caused by an illegal and unilateral secession of a part of its territory constitutes a sufficiently direct damage for the protection of the financial interests of the Union,” said the lawyer against what the Court of Accounts suggests.
Although it takes for granted that there is no damage to community finances, the community government questions that a period of two months be imposed to apply the amnesty: “certain provisions of the law prevent the Court of Accounts from guaranteeing the application of the right of the Union and in particular verify whether the financial interests of the Union are affected in the main issue.” “In the opinion of the Commission, the preliments are not hypothetical since the Court of Accounts is seen in the impossibility of verifying a possible violation of the right of union because the national procedural law is not allowed or only hinders the meaning of the jurisprudence mentioned in the question of the Court,” said Urraca Caviedes.
That approach collides with procedural reality: there have been no consequences before the decision of some jurisdictional bodies of not applying amnesty. It is the argument used by the State's lawyer, who has assured that “the independence of the court is not at stake”: “The period of two months has passed since the entry into force of the Organic Law of Amnesty without materialized by any of the dangers it raises: the reality is that the Court of Accounts has not resolved on the application of the law to the defendants, has suspended the main procedure and has not suspended the main procedure and has not suspended the main procedure and has not suspended precautionary measures adopted within its bosom, being waiting for the resolution of the matter before the Court of Justice ”.
In that same line, Carles Puigdemont, Gonzalo Boye, who recalled that the judges of the process took more than 300 days to issue a sentence, has pronounced. “It does not affect the application. It is not a real term,” he said on the term established in the norm, which has already been breached: “Two months do not limit justice, they guarantee it.”
One of the court questions to the government lawyer has had to do precisely with that period of two months. Specifically, he has questioned whether the constitutional ruling prevents raising new prejudicial and the lawyer has assured that “further approach.”
The scope of terrorism
In the afternoon shift, the scope of the amnesty has been examined regarding the crimes of terrorism for which a dozen people are accused, pending judgment at the National Court and that prison sentences of more than 20 years are played. The negotiation of the law had in this part one of the most friction points and finally the terrorist acts that have intentionally caused serious violations of human rights, such as death or torture were finally raised as the sole exception. That did not happen during the process Neither 1-O nor in the riots.
The view has focused on fundamentally technical aspects in this case and it will be the judges of Luxembourg who will have to make an interpretation of the lace of the norm with respect to community law. Both the Prosecutor's Office and the State Advocacy have ensured that oblivion has a place without violating the directive and has recalled that the amnesty “has a purpose that is none other than overcoming a conflict of a political nature and the restoration of social peace.”
As he did in his written observations, the European Commission believes that the CDR accused of terrorism “does not oppose” the “primacy” of the right of the EU a priori, but leaves the matter in the hands of the national courts, which are the ones that will have to determine the scope of the norm with respect to the time and objectives it pursues.
“The Commission considers that an amnesty so wide that it greatly excludes the effective persecution of the infractions defined in the directive during a long period and without sufficiently limiting its scope to the objectives that pursue, or by excessively vague definitions that could generate legal insecurity, would exceed the limits the requirements of the rule of law for amnesties,” said the representative of the commission, which left the commission. Determine “if the provisions of the amnesty law comply with the conditions required by the principles of legal certainty and equality before the law and, therefore, among others, if the difference in treatment they introduce is based on an objective and reasonable criterion.”
