Opinion of Advocate General Gulmann delivered on 13 July 1994

1 Original language: French.

2 OJ 1992 L 231, p. 9.

3 Case 26/86 Deutz und Geldermann v Council [1987] ECR 941.

4 OJ 1987 L 84, p. 1.

5 OJ 1992 L 231, p. 1.

6 So far as the designation crémant is concerned, the Court, in its judgment in Case C-309/89 Codomiu v Council [1994] ECR I-1853, annulled the corresponding provision in Regulation No 3309/85 on the ground that it infringed the principle of nondiscrimination.

7 Winzersekt also argues that the provisions at issue infringe the fundamental right to the protection of property in so far as they involve expropriation of the designation which ties at the centre of the association's commercial success and forms part of its assets. I need not enter into a discussion of this argument since an examination of the legality of the provisions in question in the light of this fundamental right was not requested by the national court, before which the association had in any event already set out this line of argument, which, prima facie, is not well founded.

8 Case C-3/91 Exportur SA v LOR SA and Confiserie du Tech [1992] ECRI-5529.

9 Judgment in Case 265/87 Schröder v Hauptzollamt Gronau [1989] ECR2237, paragraph 15. See also the judgment in Case 234/85 Staatsanwalt Freiburg v Keller [1986] ECR 2897, paragraphs 8 and 9.

10 The two institutions also cited the Paris Convention for the Protection of Industrial Property of 20 March 1883 (revised at Stockholm on 14 July 1967), the Madrid Arrangement for the Repression of False or Deceptive Indications of Source (revised at Lisbon on 31 October 1958) and the Lisbon Arrangement for the Protection of Appellations of Origin and their International Registration of 31 October 1958 (revised at Stockholm on 14 July 1967).

11 That resolution is worded as follows:In the interest of safeguarding the effective application of designations of origin and geographical descriptions, the General Assembly has decided that the protection of designations of origin and geographical descripuons of wines fixed and determined by the competent national authorities requires discontinuation of the use of designations or designations of origin used to identify products from the wine sector or similar products not originating in the areas indicated or which do not satisfy the conditions governing the use of those names, even if those names are accompanied by delocalizing terms or by words such as style, type, manner, taste or other similar expression, without, however, excluding arrangements to regulate certain individual customary cases; likewise, brand-names which include those names (specific designations or designations of origin) or words, parts of words, signs or illustrations liable to create a risk of confusion as to the geographical origin of a product may not be used for those products.

12 The Council and Commission referred in particular to the agreements concluded with Austria, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania and Australia. Of these, account need be taken only of that concluded with Austria, since it is common ground that the other agreements were concluded after the adoption of the regulation here at issue, which in any event is no more than a consolidation of Regulation No 3309/85, the recitals in the preamble to which already contained the reference to international obligations. The text of the Agreement of 23 December 1988 between the European Economic Community and the Republic of Austria on the control and reciprocal protection of quality wines and retsina wine is published at OJ 1989 L 56, p. 2.

13 The text of the agreement can be found in the Bundes-gesetzbhtt 1961 II, p. 23, and in the Journal Officiel de la République Française of 3 June 1961, p. 5022.

14 OJ 1989 L 232, p. 13.

15 OJ 1992 L 208, p. 1.

16 See, inter alia, the judgment in Joined Cases 124/76 and 20/77 Moulins Pont-à-Mousson v Office Interprofessionnel des Céréales [1977] ECR 1795, paragraph 17.

17 Judgment in Case C-309/89 Codomiu v Council [1994] ECR I-1853.