The Citizens’ Committee of the Minority SafePack ECI requests the General Court of the European Union to annul the Commission’s decision on the initiative

On 24 March 2021 the Citizens’ Committee of the “Minority SafePack – One million signatures for diversity in Europe” European Citizens’ Initiative (MSPI) filed at the General Court of the European Union a request for the annulment of the European Commission’s decision on the initiative, which it made public in its Communication of 15 January 2021.

The submission was based on a careful legal examination of the Commission's response by the Citizens’ Committee, the Federal Union of European Nationalities (FUEN), the coordinator of the European signature collection campaign, and their legal representatives. They concluded that the communication is deeply flawed by the fact that in it the European Commission infringed its legal obligation to state reasons and committed manifest errors of assessment.

The Commission has failed to correctly interpret the initiative. The measures brought forward by the Commission are manifestly inappropriate having regard to the objectives of the Minority SafePack Initiative.

There are also sufficient grounds to believe that the Commission has not complied with its obligation to state reasons, which constitutes a gross procedural error. Furthermore, the Commission did not address the oral submissions the initiators made at the meeting with the Commission and at the public hearing held in the European Parliament. The Commission also failed to address the detailed written explanations and clarifications on the scope of the MSPI provided by the initiators.

Based on the above, the Citizens’ Committee and the FUEN, see sufficient ground to apply for the annulment of the Commission’s Communication.