Avis juridique important

Order of the President of the Court of 18 November 1999. - Pfizer Animal Health SA and Others v Commission of the European Communities and Others. - Appeal - Order of the President of the Court of First Instance in proceedings for interim relief - Serious and irreparable damage - Consideration of damage suffered by interveners. - Case C-329/99 P (R). European Court reports 1999 Page I-08343

Summary

1 Appeals - Pleas in law - Plea alleging incorrect assessment of the facts - Inadmissible

(Art. 225 EC; EC Statute of the Court of Justice, Art. 51)

2 Appeals - Pleas in law - Plea alleging incorrect appraisal of the evidence - Inadmissible

(EC Statute of the Court of Justice, Art. 51)

3 Applications for interim measures - Suspension of operation of a measure - Conditions for admissibility - Main action must be prima facie admissible

(Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice, Art. 83(1))

4 Procedure - Intervention - Conditions for leave to intervene - Prospective intervener must have an interest in the outcome of the dispute - Intervention in the context of an application for suspension of operation of a Community measure - Whether the intervener has a personal right to interim legal protection - No such right

(EC Statute of the Court of Justice, Art. 37)

1 Under Article 225 EC and Article 51 of the EC Statute of the Court of Justice, an appeal is to be limited to points of law and must lie on the grounds of lack of competence of the Court of First Instance, a breach of procedure before it which adversely affects the interests of the appellant or the infringement of Community law by the Court of First Instance. The Court of First Instance has exclusive jurisdiction, however, to establish the facts, save where a substantive inaccuracy in its findings is apparent from the documents submitted to it, and to appraise those facts.

2 The Court of Justice does not in principle have jurisdiction in appeals to examine evidence which the Court of First Instance has accepted in support of its findings of fact or assessment of the facts. Where the general principles of law and rules of procedure governing the burden of proof and the taking of evidence have been observed, it is for the Court of First Instance alone to assess the weight to be attributed to the evidence produced.

3 It follows from the first subparagraph of Article 83(1) of the Rules of Procedure of the Court of Justice that only the person who has challenged a measure of an institution in proceedings before the Court has standing to apply for suspension of operation of that measure. Furthermore, in order for that application for suspension of operation to be held admissible, the applicant must establish that there are grounds for concluding prima facie that the main application to which the application for interim measures relates is admissible, in order to prevent a situation where that person is able, by means of an application for interim measures, to obtain suspension of the operation of a measure which the Court subsequently refuses to declare void because, on examination of the substance of the case, the application is declared inadmissible.

4 As regards the conditions which a person must satisfy in order to obtain leave to intervene in a case, Article 37 of the Statute of the Court of Justice requires only that he establish an interest in the result of the case, since intervention is of an ancillary nature in relation to the subject-matter of the case. It follows that, in the context of an application for suspension of operation of a measure, although an intervener may assert his interests, he cannot widen the subject-matter of the dispute by laying claim to a personal right to interim legal protection.

The urgency of an application for the adoption of interim measures must therefore be assessed in the light of the extent to which an interlocutory order is necessary in order to avoid serious and irreparable damage to the party seeking the adoption of the interim measure.