March 16 (SeeNews) - The Court of Justice of the European Union ruled as inadmissible on Thursday a double infringement procedure by the European Commission against Bulgaria for failing to take measures to mitigate ambient air pollution.
"In the letter of formal notice sent to Bulgaria at the end of 2018, the Commission neither alleged nor established with sufficient clarity that the Court’s 2017 judgment establishing the first failure to fulfil obligations had still not been complied with in the intervening period," the court said in a judgment published on its website.
In 2017, the EU court ruled that Bulgaria had failed to fulfil its obligations under the EU's Ambient Air Quality Directive, which requires member states to comply with limits on certain atmospheric pollutants or take immediate measures if those limits are exceeded.
In 2018, the Commission sent Bulgaria a letter of formal notice asking it to address the infringements by early 2019. As it did not receive a satisfactory response, the EU executive later took Bulgaria to court, seeking the payment of a lump sum fine and a daily penalty payment until the initial court judgment is complied with in full.
However, in its latest decision the EU court found that the letter of formal notice sent in 2018 did not make remaining obligations under the 2017 ruling sufficiently clear. Consequently, the court ruled illegitimate the Commission's allegation that Bulgaria had failed twofold to take the necessary measures to comply with the initial court judgment.
"A Member State cannot legitimately be accused of having failed to fulfil its obligation to take the necessary measures to comply with a judgment of the Court if it is not clear from the letter of formal notice that, on the reference date, the obligation to comply with that judgment has continued to exist since its delivery," the EU court noted.
In 2020, the Commission referred Bulgaria to the Court of Justice of the EU over the country's failure to comply with a previous court ruling which found that the country is in breach of the EU's ambient air quality legislation.