PAN Europe V. European Commission Reference : No description Complaint date : February 21, 2023 Status : Not judged Place of jurisdiction : European Union, Luxembourg Plaintiffs types : Environmental NGOs Plaintiffs names : Pesticide Action Network Europe (PAN Europe) Defendants : European Commission Lawyers for Health and Environmental Justice : No description Case nature : Administrative Type(s), Product(s), Active substance(s) : Cypermethrin Requests : Challenge the refusal of the European Commission to transmit the documents that led to the renewal of the authorization of cypermethrin Name of the Court : Court of Justice of the European Union of Luxembourg, European Union Jurisdiction level : No description Summary : On February 21, 2023, the NGO network PAN Europe filed an appeal before the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in order to obtain access to the documents that led to the renewal of the authorization of cypermethrin, which the European Commission refused to provide. The action is based on Regulation N°1367/2006 implementing the Aarhus Convention and Regulation N° 1049/2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents. On June 23, 2022, PAN Europe had requested access to several communications related to the proposed renewal of the authorizations of sulfoxaflor and cypermethrin, including internal communications in the Commission and communications between the Commission and the European Food Safety Agency (EFSA). On September 23, 2022, PAN Europe completed its request by asking the Commission to provide the position of the Member States in the re-approval process of the two active substances. The Commission twice refused to provide the requested documents, invoking the exception relating to the protection of the decision-making process in article 4, paragraph 3 of regulation 1049/2001, according to which the right of access to documents of the institutions of the European Union may be refused if a communication is likely to undermine the protection of the decision-making process of the institution concerned. However, the Pollinis France v. European Commission case law of the CJEU (joined cases T-371/20 and T-554/20), on which PAN Europe is founded, specifies that when the decision-making process has been completed, and is no longer ongoing, an EU institution can only use the exception to the right of access to documents under more restricted conditions. Thus, as the renewal process of cypermethrin has been completed by the adoption of the implementing regulation (EU) No. 2021/2049 of November 24, 2021 renewing the approval of the active substance "cypermethrin" as a substance for which substitution is envisaged for 7 years - and this, despite the negative opinion of EFSA -, PAN Europe argues that the refusal of the Commission to transmit the requested documents is not legal. While the documents requested in June 2022 concerned both sulfoxaflor and cypermethrin, the appeal concerns only the documents relating to cypermethrin, as outdoor uses of sulfoxaflor have been banned. Scientific references : No scientifice reference for this case. Related links : Article PAN Europe. "PAN EU challenges Commission secrecy about highly toxic pesticides in EU Court"