Meetings held by the Council of the EU

Council of the European Union did not have the information requested.

Dear Council of the EU,

Under the right of access to documents in the EU treaties, as developed in Regulation 1049/2001, I am requesting documents which contain the following information:

a) The minutes of the following meetings in which the EU Turkey deal was discussed in regards to its compliance with international and European law:
- COREPER meetings held on the 9.03.2016 and 11.03.2016
- Justice and Home Affairs Council meetings held on the 10.03.2016 and 11.03.2016
- General Affairs Council meeting held on the 15.03.2016
b) All documents generated or received by the Council to prepare the above mentioned meetings and the issues discussed, such as agenda set or expert papers (including as well the documents containing legal advice and/or analysis).
c) All the documents generated after the above mentioned meetings which contain a summary of the meetings, conclusions, policy lines or activities agreed.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you need any clarification in regards to any aspect of my request.

Thank you in advance.

Yours faithfully,

Alba Gutiérrez- Access Info Europe

Postmaster Consilium, Council of the European Union

Your message has been received by the Transparency and Access to Documents Unit of the General Secretariat of the Council of the European Union. All requests for access to documents are treated on the basis of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to
European Parliament, Council and Commission documents. The General Secretariat will reply to your request within 15 working days upon registration of your request. Requests received before 5 PM on a working day are registered on the same day. Requests received after 5 PM are registered on the first following working day.

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L'unité "Transparence et accès aux documents" du Secrétariat général du Conseil de l'Union européenne a bien reçu votre message. Toutes les demandes d'accès à des documents sont traitées conformément au règlement (CE) n° 1049/2001 du 30 mai 2001 relatif à l'accès du public aux documents du Parlement européen, du Conseil et de la Commission. Le Secrétariat général répondra à votre demande dans un délai de 15 jours ouvrables à compter de l'enregistrement de celle-ci. Les demandes reçues les jours ouvrables avant 17 heures sont enregistrées le jour même. Les demandes reçues après 17 heures sont enregistrées le premier jour ouvrable suivant.

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Ihre Nachricht ist bei der Dienststelle "Transparenz und Zugang zu Dokumenten" des General-sekretariats des Rates der Europäischen Union eingegangen. Alle Anträge auf Zugang zu Dokumenten werden gemäß der Verordnung (EG) Nr. 1049/2001 vom 30. Mai 2001 über den Zugang der Öffentlichkeit zu Dokumenten des Europäischen Parlaments, des Rates und der Kommission bearbeitet. Das Generalsekretariat wird Ihnen binnen fünfzehn Arbeitstagen nach Registrierung Ihres Antrags eine Antwort übermitteln. Anträge, die an einem Arbeitstag vor 17.00 Uhr eingehen, werden noch am selben Tages registriert. Nach 17.00 Uhr eingehende Anträge werden am erstfolgenden Arbeitstag registriert.

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SECRETARIAT DGF Access, Council of the European Union

2 Attachments

 
Please find attached a letter from the General Secretariat of the Council
concerning your request for access under Regulation 1049/2001.
       
Yours sincerely,
 
Transparency and Access to Documents
 
 
General Secretariat of the Council
Communication and Document Management
Document Management
Transparency and Access to Documents
 
Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat, 175 - B-1048 Bruxelles/Brussel - Belgique/België
[1]www.consilium.europa.eu  |  [2][email address]
 
Disclaimer: The views expressed are solely those of the writer and may not
be regarded as stating an official position of the Council of the EU
Clause de non-responsabilité: Les avis exprimés n'engagent que leur auteur
et ne peuvent être considérés comme une position officielle du Conseil de
l'UE
 
 

References

Visible links
1. http://www.consilium.europa.eu/
2. mailto:[email address]

SECRETARIAT DGF Access, Council of the European Union

2 Attachments

Please find attached a letter from the General Secretariat of the Council
concerning your request for access under Regulation 1049/2001.

                                

Yours sincerely,

 

 

Transparency and Access to Documents

 

 

General Secretariat of the Council

Communication and Document Management

Document Management

Transparency and Access to Documents

 

Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat, 175 - B-1048 Bruxelles/Brussel - Belgique/België

[1]www.consilium.europa.eu  |  [2][email address]

 

Disclaimer: The views expressed are solely those of the writer and may not
be regarded as stating an official position of the Council of the EU

Clause de non-responsabilité: Les avis exprimés n'engagent que leur auteur
et ne peuvent être considérés comme une position officielle du Conseil de
l'UE

 

 

 

References

Visible links
1. http://www.consilium.europa.eu/
2. mailto:[email address]

Alba Gutiérrez

Dear Mr. Thomsen,
Thank you for the reply to my request.
The reply however, only appears to answer point c) of my original request.
Therefore, I would like to clarify the following from my previous request:
a) The minutes of the following meetings in which the EU Turkey deal was discussed in regards to its compliance with international and European law:
- COREPER meetings held on the 9.03.2016 and 11.03.2016
- Justice and Home Affairs Council meetings held on the 10.03.2016 and 11.03.2016
- General Affairs Council meeting held on the 15.03.2016
Have minutes/outcome of proceedings of the above-mentioned meetings been recorded? If so, can they be disclosed?
b) All documents generated or received by the Council to prepare the above-mentioned meetings and the issues discussed, such as agenda set or expert papers (including as well the documents containing legal advice and/or analysis).
Can any of the above-mentioned documents be disclosed? (Do any such documents exist?)
c) All the documents generated after the above mentioned meetings which contain a summary of the meetings, conclusions, policy lines or activities agreed.
Do any such documents exist, and if they do exist, can they be disclosed?

Thank you.
Yours sincerely,

Alba Gutiérrez

Postmaster Consilium, Council of the European Union

Your message has been received by the Transparency and Access to Documents Unit of the General Secretariat of the Council of the European Union. All requests for access to documents are treated on the basis of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to
European Parliament, Council and Commission documents. The General Secretariat will reply to your request within 15 working days upon registration of your request. Requests received before 5 PM on a working day are registered on the same day. Requests received after 5 PM are registered on the first following working day.

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To see the text of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001, please click here:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexU...

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L'unité "Transparence et accès aux documents" du Secrétariat général du Conseil de l'Union européenne a bien reçu votre message. Toutes les demandes d'accès à des documents sont traitées conformément au règlement (CE) n° 1049/2001 du 30 mai 2001 relatif à l'accès du public aux documents du Parlement européen, du Conseil et de la Commission. Le Secrétariat général répondra à votre demande dans un délai de 15 jours ouvrables à compter de l'enregistrement de celle-ci. Les demandes reçues les jours ouvrables avant 17 heures sont enregistrées le jour même. Les demandes reçues après 17 heures sont enregistrées le premier jour ouvrable suivant.

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Pour consulter le texte du règlement (CE) n° 1049/2001, cliquez ici:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexU...

Si le lien ne s'ouvre pas lorsque vous cliquez dessus, veuillez copier-coller l'adresse dans votre navigateur.

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Ihre Nachricht ist bei der Dienststelle "Transparenz und Zugang zu Dokumenten" des General-sekretariats des Rates der Europäischen Union eingegangen. Alle Anträge auf Zugang zu Dokumenten werden gemäß der Verordnung (EG) Nr. 1049/2001 vom 30. Mai 2001 über den Zugang der Öffentlichkeit zu Dokumenten des Europäischen Parlaments, des Rates und der Kommission bearbeitet. Das Generalsekretariat wird Ihnen binnen fünfzehn Arbeitstagen nach Registrierung Ihres Antrags eine Antwort übermitteln. Anträge, die an einem Arbeitstag vor 17.00 Uhr eingehen, werden noch am selben Tages registriert. Nach 17.00 Uhr eingehende Anträge werden am erstfolgenden Arbeitstag registriert.

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Den Text der Verordnung (EG) Nr. 1049/2001 finden Sie hier:
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SECRETARIAT DGF Access, Council of the European Union

1 Attachment

Dear Ms Gutiérrez,

 

Apologies if our reply has not fully satisfied your request or was
unclear.

 

Let me specify our reply as follows.

 

You were requesting:

 

a) The minutes of the following meetings in which the EU Turkey deal was
discussed in regards to its compliance with international and European
law:

 

- COREPER meetings held on the 9.03.2016 and 11.03.2016

- Justice and Home Affairs Council meetings held on the 10.03.2016 and
11.03.2016

- General Affairs Council meeting held on the 15.03.2016 Have
minutes/outcome of proceedings of the above-mentioned meetings been
recorded? If so, can they be disclosed?

 

As explained in our letter of 12 May 2016, the Council does not consider
the EU-Turkey statement of 18 May 2016 as an international  agreement
within the meaning of Article 218 TFEU, nor does the Council consider this
statement to be a "deal". The statement, only contains political
commitments without having any legally binding effect under Union law,
aiming mainly at facilitating the actions to be taken by Greece and Turkey
under their national law.

 

None of the meetings you mention,  discussed the EU-Turkey statement (or
"deal" as you call it ) of 18 March 2016 and consequently they did NOT
discuss "its compliance with international and European law" either. As
mentioned, the statement itself is not legally binding  but contains only
political commitments that need to be implemented in legal acts by
national authorities. The requested minutes therefore have no relevance to
your request.

 

b) All documents generated or received by the Council to prepare the
above-mentioned meetings and the issues discussed, such as agenda set or
expert papers (including as well the documents containing legal advice
and/or analysis).

Can any of the above-mentioned documents be disclosed? (Do any such
documents exist?)

 

Considering the reply to a), there have been NO expert papers nor any
other documents. As explained in our reply letter of 12 May 2016 the
"Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the
European Council and the Council on the "Next operational steps in
EU-Turkey cooperation in the field of migration"  is the only document
containing a detailed analysis of the criteria for ensuring the legality
of implementation of the statement.

 

Further analysis of the implementation of the statement, including legal
aspects,  can be found in the monthly monitoring reports of the
Commission, which are publicly available ( a first report has been issued
on 21 April 2016).

 

For further information, we can also refer you to the debates in the
European Parliament which were held in plenary on 28 April 2016 " Legal
aspects, democratic control and implementation of the EU-Turkey agreement

Council and Commission statements" (video and verbatim at:
[1]http://www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getD...
)

and more specifically on the  "Legal aspects of the EU - Turkey statement
of 18 March 2016" in the Civil Liberties , Justice and Home Affairs
Committee on 9 May 2016 (you can watch the video at:
[2]http://www.europarl.europa.eu/ep-live/en...
)

which further clarify the exact context.

 

Hope this is helpful.

 

Yours sincerely,

 

 

Transparency and Access to Documents

 

 

General Secretariat of the Council

Communication and Document Management

Document Management

Transparency and Access to Documents

 

Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat, 175 - B-1048 Bruxelles/Brussel - Belgique/België

[3]www.consilium.europa.eu  |  [4][email address]

 

Disclaimer: The views expressed are solely those of the writer and may not
be regarded as stating an official position of the Council of the EU

Clause de non-responsabilité: Les avis exprimés n'engagent que leur auteur
et ne peuvent être considérés comme une position officielle du Conseil de
l'UE

 

 

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Alba Gutiérrez

Dear SECRETARIAT DGF Access,

Thank you for your response. I will submit a separate request for the meetings then.

Yours sincerely,

Alba Gutiérrez

Postmaster Consilium, Council of the European Union

Your message has been received by the Transparency and Access to Documents Unit of the General Secretariat of the Council of the European Union. All requests for access to documents are treated on the basis of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to
European Parliament, Council and Commission documents. The General Secretariat will reply to your request within 15 working days upon registration of your request. Requests received before 5 PM on a working day are registered on the same day. Requests received after 5 PM are registered on the first following working day.

***

This notification was sent from an unattended mailbox. Please do not reply.

***

To see the text of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001, please click here:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexU...

If the link doesn't open when you click on it, please copy - paste it into your browser.

***

L'unité "Transparence et accès aux documents" du Secrétariat général du Conseil de l'Union européenne a bien reçu votre message. Toutes les demandes d'accès à des documents sont traitées conformément au règlement (CE) n° 1049/2001 du 30 mai 2001 relatif à l'accès du public aux documents du Parlement européen, du Conseil et de la Commission. Le Secrétariat général répondra à votre demande dans un délai de 15 jours ouvrables à compter de l'enregistrement de celle-ci. Les demandes reçues les jours ouvrables avant 17 heures sont enregistrées le jour même. Les demandes reçues après 17 heures sont enregistrées le premier jour ouvrable suivant.

***

S'il vous plaît ne répondez pas à ce message, car il a été envoyé d'une boîte aux lettres sans surveillance.

***

Pour consulter le texte du règlement (CE) n° 1049/2001, cliquez ici:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexU...

Si le lien ne s'ouvre pas lorsque vous cliquez dessus, veuillez copier-coller l'adresse dans votre navigateur.

***

Ihre Nachricht ist bei der Dienststelle "Transparenz und Zugang zu Dokumenten" des General-sekretariats des Rates der Europäischen Union eingegangen. Alle Anträge auf Zugang zu Dokumenten werden gemäß der Verordnung (EG) Nr. 1049/2001 vom 30. Mai 2001 über den Zugang der Öffentlichkeit zu Dokumenten des Europäischen Parlaments, des Rates und der Kommission bearbeitet. Das Generalsekretariat wird Ihnen binnen fünfzehn Arbeitstagen nach Registrierung Ihres Antrags eine Antwort übermitteln. Anträge, die an einem Arbeitstag vor 17.00 Uhr eingehen, werden noch am selben Tages registriert. Nach 17.00 Uhr eingehende Anträge werden am erstfolgenden Arbeitstag registriert.

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Diese Nachricht wurde automatisch generiert. Bitte nicht antworten.

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Den Text der Verordnung (EG) Nr. 1049/2001 finden Sie hier:
http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexU...

Wenn sich der Link beim Anklicken nicht öffnet, kopieren Sie den bitte mit "copy/paste" in Ihren Browser.

SECRETARIAT DGF Access, Council of the European Union

1 Attachment

Dear Ms Gutierrez,

 

You may of course submit a new request to get access to the documents of
the meetings you referred to.  However, the agendas of these meetings are
public and as replied earlier, you will find out that nor COREPER, nor the
JHA Council, nor the General Affairs Council had any discussion on the EU-
Turkey statement nor its implementation.

 

The EU- Turkey statement of 18 March 2016 is a political, non-legally
binding commitment that has been drafted, accepted by the Members of the
European Council and their Turkish counterpart, and issued as an immediate
result of the informal EU-Turkey summit. It has NOT been prepared in any
preparatory body of the Council.  

 

We will examine your new request but even if we grant access to all
documents of these meetings, you will have many documents on a wide
variety of subjects however none of them will be related to the subject of
your issue.  We are therefore afraid that you will not find the alleged
preparatory acts/minutes/conclusions/legal advice you are looking for
since they simply do not exist. 

 

"The compliance with EU law and international law" does not require
checking of an EU document (which moreover does not exists) , but should
be checked against the legal implementing measures of the commitments, to
be enacted by Greece and Turkey.

 

The Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the 
European Council and the Council on the "Next operational steps in 
EU-Turkey cooperation in the field of migration" we already referred to,
is very clear in this respect. It sets out a detailed analysis of the
criteria for ensuring the legality  of implementation of the statement,
which implies that checking the legality of the statement itself is
superfluous since the statement is NOT legally binding nor has it any
effect as such. We are confident that the EU-Statement of 18 March 2016 is
indeed in compliance with EU law and international law, but in the extreme
case it would NOT be in compliance, this would only have a moral and not a
legal effect.

 

"The compliance" of the implementation measures, including the legal
"transposition" of the commitments by Greece and Turkey,  is the real
issue at stake and is  monitored by the Commission which issues a public
report on a monthly basis.

 

Kind regards,

 

 

Transparency and Access to Documents

 

 

General Secretariat of the Council

Communication and Document Management

Document Management

Transparency and Access to Documents

 

Rue de la Loi/Wetstraat, 175 - B-1048 Bruxelles/Brussel - Belgique/België

[1]www.consilium.europa.eu  |  [2][email address]

 

Disclaimer: The views expressed are solely those of the writer and may not
be regarded as stating an official position of the Council of the EU

Clause de non-responsabilité: Les avis exprimés n'engagent que leur auteur
et ne peuvent être considérés comme une position officielle du Conseil de
l'UE

 

 

 

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