The Constitutional rejects questioning the law of amnesty before European justice | Spain
The Constitutional Court has agreed in its plenary on Tuesday that “there is no place, at this procedural moment, to the opening of a process of hearing regarding the possible approach of preliminary matters before the Court of Justice of the European Union (TJUE)” on the Amnesty Law. The agreement has been taken « without prejudice to what can be decided, in this regard, in the deliberation of the plenary of this court in which the object of this constitutional process is addressed. » They have voted against magistrates Enrique Arnaldo, Concepción Espejel and César Tolosa, belonging to the conservative block of the court.
The president of the Constitutional, Cándido Conde-Pumpid The project of judgment of the amnesty lawthrough an exhibition of the rapporteur, the vice president of the court, Immaculate Montalbán. However, the three magistrates cited had requested in writing that the Guarantees Body addressed the possibility of raising doubts about the constitutionality of the Amnesty Law, and addressing the TJUE in this regard through a preliminary ruling, by the possible contradiction between said norm and European law. Judge Ricardo Enriquez, also of the conservative sector of the Guarantee Body, did not support the defense of these requests at this procedural moment.
The agreement adopted on Wednesday by the Plenary has been limited to resolving that the discussion about a possible preliminary ruling should not be addressed “at this procedural moment”, when the expected thing was to listen to the report of the Vice President of the Court on its sentence project. All probability, therefore, the debate on the possible preliminary reference to the Luxembourg Court will once again be raised in the next plenary session, which will begin on June 23. Sources from the Constitutional Progressive Sector, now the majority, consider that there is no reason to raise any prejudicial issue to the TJUE. The predictable thing, therefore, is that another proposal in this regard is rejected again
The Court has estimated in its plenary on Tuesday, on the other hand, that « there is also no place for the various requests made by the deputies of the popular parliamentary group of this procedure, or in relation to the transfer of documents or in regard to the suspension of the processing of the proceedings. » The transfer of documents referred to the request of the magistrates of the conservative sector on the consultation of the TJUE and the parallel suspension of the procedures to discuss and vote the draft sentence on the amnesty law.
