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The European Court of Justice in its Judgment in Case C-234/18 [1] ruled that EU law does not preclude Member States from providing for civil proceedings for confiscation which are unrelated to a finding of a criminal offence. Such proceedings are not covered by the Framework Decision on the confiscation of property. BP, the Chair of the supervisory board of a Bulgarian bank was subject to criminal proceedings for having incited others, from December 2011 to 19 June 2014, to misappropriate funds belonging to that bank in the sum of approximately €105 million. The criminal proceedings are pending and have not yet given rise to a final judgment. Independently of those criminal proceedings, the Bulgarian Commission for the combatting of corruption and for the confiscation of assets found that BP and members of his family had acquired assets of a considerable value whose origin could not be established. That commission therefore brought civil proceedings before the Sofiyski grads...

By Chris Iacovides and Andri Antoniou- joint Liquidators* According to a press release issued by the Cypriot police, on 31st January 2020, a 42-year-old Ukrainian national had been arrested in Budapest pursuant to a European arrest warrant, extradited to Cyprus and remanded in custody, in connection with financial fraud totaling $92m, orchestrated through Cypriot-registered companies.  The individual arrested was the CFO of Mriya Agro Holding Public Ltd (“Mriya”), the Cypriot holding company of what was once one of Ukraine’s largest agricultural groups . Others wanted in connection with this matter are in hiding in Switzerland, where the authorities are known to be slow in executing international arrest warrants. This is the outcome of a lengthy investigation by the Cypriot police following a criminal complaint made by the Liquidators of Mriya 4 years ago and vindicates what has recently been identified in a report of the Council of Europe’s anti money ...

Ιn its judgment (3.3.2020) in the case of Baş v. Turkey (application no. 66448/17) the European Court of Human Rights held: by six votes to one, that there had been a violation of Article 5 § 1 (right to liberty and security) of the European Convention on Human Rights as regards the alleged unlawfulness of the applicant’s initial pre-trial detention; unanimously, that there had been a violation of Article 5 § 1 of the Convention on account of the lack of reasonable suspicion, at the time of the applicant’s initial pre-trial detention, that he had committed an offence, and unanimously, that there had been a violation of Article 5 § 4 (right to speedy review of the lawfulness of detention) on account of the length of the period during which the applicant had not appeared in person before a judge. The case concerned the pre-trial detention of Mr Baş, a judge at the time, following the attempted coup of 15 July 2016. The Court found that according to the case-law of the Court of Cas...

by George Kazoleas, Lawyer LL.M The rapid spread of coronavirus worldwide has crucial effects in social and economic life. The regularity of transactions has been disrupted and the normal evolution of many aspects of economic and commercial activity has been reversed. According to the World Health Organization, coronaviruses are a large family of viruses that can cause disease in animals or humans. In humans, several coronaviruses cause respiratory infections, influenza and more serious illnesses such as the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS). The most recently discovered coronavirus causes COVID-19. Coronavirus as force majeure It depends on the circumstances if the spread of the virus can be regarded as a cause of force majeure that prevents or inhibits the fulfillment of contractual obligations. The European Commission states that there is force majeure if the incident or its non-fulfillment "is due to circumstanc...

By Chris Iacovides & Andri Antoniou* Whilst the UK is taking proactive measures to aid ailing companies and business es from the aftermath of the coronavirus outbreak, one cannot help but wonder what the Cyprus government will do since the Examinership regime introduced as part of the rescue culture in 2015, failed miserably . The UK may have been slower off the mark than many other countries in their fight against coronavirus nevertheless, the authorities have now ramped up the speed and scale of the measures being implemented to protect their national health system and the economy. On Friday 27 March 2020, the British Government went to the extent of introducing more flexible insolvency procedures to help businesses. According to Alok Sharma, UK’s Business Secretary , the following measures will take effect retrospectively from March 1 st for 3 months during the coronavirus pandemic. Under the plans, new restructuring tools will be added to the UK’s Insolven...

Editor: Anastasios Tsanakas, Lawyer Numerous Jurisdictions, including the Republic of Cyprus have decided as part of their measures for the prevention of Covid 19 transmission, the suspension of Court operations. Nevertheless and for obvious reasons there can be no universal lockdown to the administration of justice. A possible solution to the imposed restrictions that inhibit justice accessibility is the development and establishment of “e-trials”. In the UK, an entire trial is being conducted over Skype in a legal first that lawyers say could be a model way to ensure court business continues during the Covid-19 pandemic. The Judge, is asked to decide whether it is in the best interests of a 70 years old man that suffered a major stroke in 2016 to have the clinically assisted nutrition and hydration he receives through a tube, withdrawn. The patient’s daughter and GP disagree over his treatment and the local clinical commissioning group has asked the court to determine the c...

Ιn its Judgment in Case C-215/18 Libuše Králová v Primera Air Scandinavia A/S, ECJ ruled that a passenger who reserved his or her flight through a travel agency may bring an action for compensation for a long flight delay against the air carrier before the courts of the place of departure of the flight. Notwithstanding the absence of a contract between that passenger and the carrier, such an action comes within ‘matters relating to a contract’ within the meaning of the regulation on jurisdiction, with the result that it may be brought before the courts of the place of supply of the air carriage service. Ms Libuše Králová entered into a package travel contract with a Czech travel agency consisting of, first, carriage by air between Prague (Czech Republic) and Keflavík (Iceland), operated by the Danish air carrier Primera Air Scandinavia, and, second, accommodation in Iceland. Ms Libuše Králová’s Prague-Keflavík flight, of 25 April 2013 was delayed by four hours. She subsequently ...

The Court of Justice takes formal notice of the fact that the withdrawal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland from the EU has the effect of bringing to an end the mandates of the British Members of the Institution with effect from 31 January 2020 at midnight.  The number of Judges of the Court of Justice and of the General Court, fixed at one for each Member State for the Court of Justice and two for each Member State for the General Court, is therefore reduced with immediate effect at the time of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU.  On the other hand, in accordance with the declaration of the Conference of the Representatives of the Governments of the Member States of 29 January 2020 on the consequences of the UK’s withdrawal from the EU for the Advocates General of the Court of Justice, the number of Advocates General of the Court of Justice, fixed at eleven by the Council Decision of 25 June 2013(2013/336/EU: Council Decision of 25 June 2013 inc...

The EU’s discussions with Poland and Hungary have not yet led these countries to realign with the EU’s founding values, Parliament warned last January . In a resolution adopted with 446 votes to 178 and 41 abstentions, MEPs note that reports and statements by the Commission, the UN, OSCE and the Council of Europe indicate that “the situation in both Poland and Hungary has deteriorated since the triggering of Article 7(1)”. MEPs point out that the hearings organised by the Council under  Article 7 of the Treaty  are neither regular nor structured. They call on the Council to address concrete recommendations to the countries concerned, including deadlines, to ensure EU law is respected. “The failure by the Council to make effective use of Article 7 continues to undermine the integrity of common European values, mutual trust and the credibility of the European Union as a whole”, claims the EP. The text also urges the Commission to use all tools at its disposal to pre...

Author: Maria Rousia, Associate Lawyer at Dionysiou & Partners LLC (Cyprus) Introduction Although generally a Cyprus company must give priority in employment recruitment to Cypriots and EU nationals before attempting to employ third country nationals, there is an exception enabling companies of foreign interests to give priority to the employment of third country nationals instead of locals and EU nationals, provided that certain requirements are met. The main aim of the above exception was the attraction of foreign investments. The criteria that companies must meet in order to benefit from this decision, the categories of staff and the maximum numbers of third country nationals who can be employed in each category of staff are described below. Eligible Companies The company must be a private company and third country shareholders should own the majority of the company’s shares (percentage equal or more than 50% of the total share capital). It is important to note that...

Moroccan journalist and activist Omar Randy will stand trial in Morocco in March on charges of insulting a judge via Twitter, according to the Observatory for Human Rights. Randy, a 33-year-old award-winning journalist who has been involved in corruption reporting in Morocco and has worked with various international media outlets, was due to be sentenced on January 2, 2020, but the case was postponed. According to CNN, Randy faces up to one year in prison if he is eventually convicted of a tweet he made nine months ago against a judge. Several people rallied in support of Randy outside the country's parliament in the capital Rabat demanding his acquittal and speaking about revenge against a reporter for investigative journalism. Last April, Randy posted a critical comment about a judge who upheld the verdict against a protest movement. The leaders of the protest movement were sentenced in June 2018 to 20 years in prison, the Human Rights Watch said. "Let us all ...

Emily O'Reilly has been re-elected  as European Ombudsman, by Parliament with 320 votes in favour out of 600 votes cast. Her second mandate will last for five years. " I am delighted to have been re-elected for a second term. I wish to sincerely thank my fantastic campaign team for the huge effort over the past four months, I wish to thank my colleagues in the Office for all their hard work over the past five years, and today most of all, I wish to thank the Members of the European Parliament,” said Ms O’Reilly. "For the next five years, I will help ensure the EU maintains the highest standards in administration, transparency and ethics. Europeans expect and deserve nothing less. One priority will remain tackling the lack of the transparency of EU law making by national governments in Brussels. We need to stop the ‘blame Brussels’ culture, when often it is citizens’ own national Ministers taking the key decisions in the EU. I will also be holding President Von...

An innovative proposal for those who are not easy to go to the law firm for legal services presented the Justibus program. The new free and traveling legal assistance project was set up in Belgium by the French Order of the Brussels Bar. The JUSTIBUS project is an initiative of the Legal Aid Commission of the French Bar Association of Brussels, with the support of the Minister of Justice Houses in charge of front-line legal aid of the Government of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation- under the leadership of Vinciane Gillet, member of the CCBE Quality sub-group.  Since 14 October 2019, the JUSTIBUS has been travelling in the 19 municipalities of Brussels, according to an established schedule, to provide free legal aid to people in precarious situations. Several volunteer lawyers run mobile hotlines and receive people to provide them with legal information that could potentially help their situation. However, volunteer lawyers and trainee lawyers do not perform legal acts. If ...

ECJ: Airbnb case- France cannot require Airbnb to hold an estate agent’s professional licence as it did not notify the Commission of that requirement in accordance with the Directive on electronic commerce. By its judgment of 19 December 2019, Airbnb Ireland (C-390/18), the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Justice held, first, that an intermediation service which, by means of an electronic platform, is intended to connect, for remuneration, potential guests with professional or non-professional hosts offering short-term accommodation services, while also providing a certain number of services ancillary to that intermediation service, must be classified as an ‘information society service’ under Directive 2000/31 on electronic commerce. [1] Secondly, the Court found that, in criminal proceedings with an ancillary civil action, an individual may oppose the application to him or her of measures of a Member State restricting the freedom to provide such a service which that indiv...