Opinion of Mr Advocate General Mancini

Mr President,

Members of the Court,

1. The Court is asked to give judgment in proceedings brought by the Commission against the Hellenic Republic for the infringement of various rules of primary Community law: Article 30 et seq. of the EEC Treaty and Articles 35 and 38 of the Act of Accession. The infringement concerns the detailed arrangements for the progressive elimination of the amounts to be paid in cash on imported goods.

2. In its defence Greece repeats the three arguments already put forward during the stage prior to the institution of the proceedings. I shall consider them one by one, beginning with the wording of Article 38.

3. The second argument is based on the objectives of the transitional period which, in the defendant's view, imply that the provision in question should be interpreted in a manner favourable to Greece. If that period is for the benefit of Greece, then, in Greece's opinion, it ought to have some discretion in fulfilling the obligations associated with it.

4. The third argument is based on the technical difficulties which would prevent the application of the annual reduction to each transaction. The cause thereof is said to be the complexity of the system (periods for payment and customs clearance, banking transactions, the issue of import licences and so forth).

5. In the oral proceedings the representative of the Greek Government pointed out that on 3 January 1984 the Minister for Commerce had stated that the system in question had been abolished as from 1 January 1984. As a result there was no purpose in establishing a failure to fulfil obligations.

6. In the light of the foregoing observations I consider that, by maintaining the requirement that certain goods should be paid for wholly in cash upon importation, the Greek Government has not progressively reduced the quantitative restrictions on the importation of those products as required by Article 38 of the Act of Accession. The effect of the measures adopted by the Greek Government has been a selective restriction of imports which is prohibited by Article 35 of the Act of Accession and Article 30 of the EEC Treaty.

I therefore propose that the Court should declare that the Hellenic Republic has failed to fulfil its obligations under the Act of Accession and the EEC Treaty.

Since the defendant Government has been unsuccessful it must be ordered to pay the costs.

1 Translated from the Italian.