Petruhhin decision
The Petruhhin decision in case C-182/15 of September 6, 2016 is a decision of the European Court of Justice on the question of the admissibility of extradition of a Union citizen to a third country.
The decision was based on the fact that the Estonian national Aleksei Petruhhin had been arrested in Latvia because of an extradition request from Russia . There is an extradition agreement between Latvia and Russia , which in principle establishes an obligation to extradite under specific conditions, but which prohibits the Latvian state from extraditing Latvian citizens.
The question therefore arose whether the prohibition of discrimination applicable in the European Union and the freedom of movement guaranteed within the Member States could prohibit individual Member States from protecting their own nationals from extradition to third countries to a greater extent than Union citizens.
The Supreme Court of Latvia referred this question to the European Court of Justice for a preliminary ruling on March 26, 2016. In the decision, the Court first stated that a regulation that protects its own nationals, but not Union citizens, from extradition interferes with the European Union's guarantee of free movement, but that this could be permissible if it pursued a legitimate legislative purpose. This could also be seen in preventing someone from being prosecuted because of a crime that has been committed. An extradition of a Union citizen to a third country is therefore possible in principle, but the state requested for extradition must first ask the Union citizen's home state whether he or she wishes to be extradited and, if necessary, grant such a request priority over the third country's extradition request.
The European Court of Justice also emphasized that no EU citizen should be extradited to a state in which he was threatened with the death penalty or torture .
Web links
- Website of the EugH
Individual evidence
- ↑ Reason for judgment of the ECJ