Criminal proceedings against Richardt: ECJ 4 Oct 1991

The existence, as a consequence of the Customs Union, of a general principle of freedom of transit of goods within the Community does not, as Article 10 of Regulation No 222/77 affirms, have the effect of precluding the Member States from verifying the nature of goods in transit, pursuant to the Treaty, in particular Article 36. That article authorizes the Member States to impose restrictions on the transit of goods on grounds of public security, which covers both a Member State’ s internal security and its external security, of which the latter manifestly requires to be taken into consideration in the case of goods capable of being used for strategic purposes.
Accordingly, the aforementioned regulation does not preclude the legislation of a Member State from requiring, on external security grounds, that special authorization must be obtained for the transit through its territory of goods described as strategic material, irrespective of the Community transit document issued by another Member State. However, the measures adopted by the Member State as a consequence of the failure to comply with that requirement must not be disproportionate to the objective pursued.

Citations:

[1991] ECR I-4621, C-367/89, [1991] EUECJ C-367/89

Links:

Bailii

Cited by:

CitedOracle America Inc v M-Tech Data Ltd SC 27-Jun-2012
The appellant complained that the respondent had imported into the European Economic Area disk drives bearing its trade marks in breach of the appellant’s rights. The respondent had argued that the appellant had abused its position by withholding . .
Lists of cited by and citing cases may be incomplete.

European, Customs and Excise

Updated: 01 June 2022; Ref: scu.160392