The European Union’s missing voice: member states’ forum shopping in military AI governance

The cooperation of European countries in matters of insolvency has a long history. It has been a 40 year project within the European Union, evolving in complexity and increasing in cooperation as the EU has expanded and changed. The culmination of this cooperation was the EU Insolvency Regulation which deals with the coordination of cross-border insolvency between member states. In 2012, INSOL Europe proposed amendments to the EIR, aimed at furthering its proper functioning by amending substantive aspects and improving technical rules. Among the fundamental issues to be resolved was the ease with which companies can “forum shop” among member states to identify a jurisdiction providing the most advantageous environment to commence insolvency proceedings. However, goal of reducing forum shopping overall is not helped by the existence of divergent rules of employment protection among the member states. Underpinned by traditionally opposing socio-political values, the juxtaposition of insolvency law and employment protection is difficult to reconcile. However, in these times following the financial crisis and its slow recovery, business failures and unemployment are both at the forefront of economic concerns. The EU has applied itself to the intersection of employment protection and insolvency procedures within the Acquired Rights Directive, which contains provisions requiring the transfer of employment contracts to the buyer of a business or a part thereof upon its transfer, including those transfers which occur as a result of corporate rescue procedures. As the ARD provisions took the form of an EU directive, the form and method of implementation of the ARD was left to the member states as long as the intended results of the directive were achieved within national legislation. A number of derogations were also available within the ARD, including the potential to disapply the transfer provisions if the transferor were: “…subject to bankruptcy proceedings or any analogous insolvency proceedings which have been instituted with a view to [the] liquidation....” of a company. The application of employee transfer provisions in corporate rescue procedures has not failed to cause controversy over the 37 years since its initial implementation, significantly as the derogation for insolvency procedures was not present in the original ARD. Many EU and national cases have caused further complications, particularly in relation to how national social policies affect the aims of corporate rescue with regard to the relative favouritism of the safeguarding of employment. Social policy legislation also has an effect on how insolvency systems function in practice as the procedural outcomes can affect a variety of more vulnerable entities such as employees, their families, and the community at large. The relative protection of these more vulnerable entities differs from member state to member state according to diverse national views on the importance of social policy matters. A conception of the effectiveness of insolvency and business rescue procedures that includes a reflection upon the interaction of state and EU requirements of employee protection legislation would likely encourage a more holistic approach to improving cross-border insolvency within the EU. While such a matter is not strictly the prevue of EU insolvency law in its current scope, there are practical matters affecting how a pan-European rescue culture can function with the greatest efficiency when the conflicting goals of insolvency and the protection of employment are not recognised and, to some extent, managed. Among the EU member states that continue to exhibit fundamentally different approaches to corporate rescue and employment protection, the United Kingdom and France present two extreme examples. Through the comparison of two divergent but also highly influential EU jurisdictions, both historically and in the current political climate, an example of the obstacles facing overall convergence in this area can be demonstrated. The differences in these two jurisdictions will also help to highlight the problems associated with differing levels of social protection in terms of jurisdictional competitiveness and cross-border cooperation. This article will discuss the parallel evolution of corporate rescue and the implementation of the ARD in the UK and France with a view to illuminating these obstacles to convergence. While harmonisation in the area of social policy continues to be resisted by many member states, it could be that such harmonisation or at least convergence might assist in capturing a greater cohesiveness in cross-border business and insolvency and level the field of competition between the member states of the EU.

The Dublin system of refugee admission is a European legal framework designed to address the problem of refugees in Europe by allocating responsibility [of examining asylum applications] to Member States. It is intended to facilitate the asylum application process of third country nationals coming to Europe by, inter alia, ensuring effective and accessible asylum procedures, maintaining family unity, guaranteeing the full respect for the principle of non-refoulement and by preventing potential 'forum shopping' by asylum seekers. For this, it consists of hierarchy of objective criteria on which the responsibility of the Member States is determined. Following such criteria, once a Member State found that another Member State is responsible to evaluate the asylum application of a particular asylum seeker, it can request the latter State to take charge of the claim. Upon acceptance of such request, it can also transfer the asylum seeker to the responsible Member State. This paper questions the efficiency of this System by examining it both from theoretical and practical scenarios. Accordingly, by modeling the various universal refugee Conventions and those EU agreements establishing the Dublin System as 'contracts with the object of providing a public good of international protection to refugees' and using the 'Cost-Incentive-Risk Sharing' Analysis, it contends that the Dublin framework is inherently flawed and inefficient system for it not only entails high transaction costs but also gives no /low/ incentive for States to discharge their contractual obligations. Besides, despite the solidarity and shared responsibility that it seeks to promote, the System lacks proper burden sharing mechanism among the various Member States that consequently made some handful States to bear the larger burden than others.

In recent years, there has been a growth in the use of English schemes of arrangement by companies registered in other EU Member States. Recent high-profile examples include TeleColumbas GmbH, Rodenstock GmbH, Primacom Holdings GmbH, Re Metrovacesa SA and Re Seat Pagine Gialle SpA, although there are many more. In each case, these companies were able to access the English scheme jurisdiction without shifting their seat or COMI to the UK. This paper investigates this phenomenon, explaining the use of an English scheme of arrangement and why it might be regarded as valuable to these companies. The paper then tackles two issues. First, it assesses how these companies are able to access the English scheme jurisdiction, and, in particular, it analyses the potential application of both the Insolvency Regulation and the Judgments Regulation in this regard. As part of this analysis, the recognition and enforcement of English schemes of arrangement in other Member States is discussed. Second, it considers whether this use of English schemes by companies registered in Germany, Spain, Italy and elsewhere gives rise to issues of forum shopping. This paper rejects the idea that forum shopping should be regarded as a concern in this context.

This article addresses two questions about the EU's and EU Member States' diplomacy in the UN General Assembly's Third Committee and the Human Rights Council: have EU Member States been more, or less, active outside the framework of EU co‐ordination since the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty? Has EU activity increased? The findings are that EU Member States have been increasingly active at the Human Rights Council and have increasingly worked with other states outside of the EU, while the level of EU activity has remained largely the same. In the Third Committee, Member States speak more than the EU but neither the EU nor Member States have been sponsoring more resolutions. Europeanization is ‘arrested’ in these cases, as Member States are reluctant to push for more EU activity because both the internal intergovernmental decision‐making system and external context discourage it.

One of the goals of the EU Insolvency Regulation, confirmed by recent reform proposals developed by the European Parliament and the Commission, is to limit forum shopping. The real world, however, looks quite different, as insolvency forum shopping is increasingly common in the EU. As is well known, pursuant to the Insolvency Regulation the Member State of a debtor’s centre of main interests (“COMI”) is competent to govern its main insolvency proceeding with universal effects; additionally, companies’ COMI is presumed to coincide with their registered office, unless the contrary is proven. Pursuant to ECJ case law, the reference date to assess the insolvency competence is the date of the filing, with the consequence that, if a company relocates its registered office abroad before filing for insolvency, the new jurisdiction becomes competent to govern its insolvency, unless creditors prove that the COMI is still in the original State. However, the presumption that the COMI coincides with the registered office can not be rebutted if a company actually relocates its headquarter alongside its registered office in a way ascertainable by third parties. Creditors’ protection against opportunistic forum shopping, therefore, relies only upon the criterion that a company’s COMI must be ascertainable by third parties. This criterion, however, as applied by Member States’ case law and the ECJ, does not take into account the viewpoint of pre-existing creditors: If a company relocates headquarter alongside its registered office and makes this transfer public and “ascertainable” for future potential creditors, no evidence whatsoever can be provided that its COMI is still in the State of origin. Forum shopping, therefore, has become an unavoidable component of EU insolvency law.

One of the goals of the EU Insolvency Regulation, confirmed by recent reform proposals of the European Parliament and the Commission, is to limit forum shopping. The real world, however, looks quite different, as forum shopping is becoming increasingly common in the EU. The reason for the increase in forum shopping cases is hidden in the mechanisms of the Insolvency Regulation. It is well known that the Member State of a debtor’s centre of main interests (COMI) is competent to govern its main insolvency proceeding with universal effects. Additionally, companies’ COMI is presumed to coincide with their registered office, unless the contrary is proven. Nowadays, however, companies can often transfer their registered office throughout the European Union. Additionally, pursuant to ECJ case law, the reference date to assess the insolvency competence is the date of filing, with the consequence that, if a company relocates its registered office abroad before the filing, the new jurisdiction becomes competent to govern its insolvency, unless creditors prove that the COMI is still in the original State. However, the presumption that the COMI coincides with the registered office cannot be rebutted if a company actually relocates its headquarters alongside its registered office in a way by third parties. Creditors’ protection against opportunistic forum shopping, therefore, depends exclusively on the ascertainability criterion. This criterion, however, as applied by Member States’ case law and the ECJ, does not take into account the viewpoint of pre-existing creditors: If a company relocates its headquarters alongside its registered office and makes this transfer public and ascertainable for future potential creditors, no evidence whatsoever can be provided that its COMI is still in the State of origin. Forum shopping, therefore, has become an unavoidable component of EU insolvency law.

Urban growth is a major threat to biodiversity conservation at the global scale. Its impacts are expected to be especially detrimental when it sprawls into the landscape and reaches sites of high conservation value due to the species and ecosystems they host, such as protected areas. I analyzed the degree of urbanization (i.e., urban cover and growth rate) from 2006 to 2015 in protected sites in the Natura 2000 network, which, according to the Habitats and Birds Directives, harbor species and habitats of high conservation concern in Europe. I used data on the degree of land imperviousness from COPERNICUS to calculate and compare urban covers and growth rates inside and outside Natura 2000. I also analyzed the relationships of urban cover and growth rates with a set of characteristics of Natura sites. Urban cover inside Natura 2000 was 10 times lower than outside (0.4% vs. 4%) throughout the European Union. However, the rates of urban growth were slightly higher inside than outside Natura 2000 (4.8% vs. 3.9%), which indicates an incipient urban sprawl inside the network. In general, Natura sites affected most by urbanization were those surrounded by densely populated areas (i.e., urban clusters) that had a low number of species or habitats of conservation concern, albeit some member states had high urban cover or growth rate or both in protected sites with a large number of species or habitats of high conservation value. Small Natura sites had more urban cover than large sites, but urban growth rates were highest in large Natura sites. Natura 2000 is protected against urbanization to some extent, but there is room for improvement. Member states must enact stricter legal protection and control law enforcement to halt urban sprawl into protected areas under the greatest pressure from urban sprawl (i.e., close to urban clusters). Such actions are particularly needed in Natura sites with high urban cover and growth rates and areas where urbanization is affecting small Natura sites of high conservation value, which are especially vulnerable and concentrated in the Mediterranean region.

Rallying United Nations organizations in the fight against noncommunicable diseases

Collective Liability of the Member States of the Unified Patent Court Agreement

This chapter examines the contents of Arts. 3-6 EIR in order to answer the following questions: which Member States have international jurisdiction; has the seized court a power and a duty to examine jurisdiction; might a creditor challenge this choice; does the jurisdiction of the seized court extend to so-called connected actions, i.e. to actions directly deriving from the insolvency proceeding and closely linked with it? For this purpose, the concept and rationale of the centre of a debtor’s main interests (COMI) is analysed, as well as the power and duty of the seized courts to examine jurisdiction. This chapter also focuses on the increasingly popular phenomenon of ‘forum shopping’, and on the theoretical and practical attempts to distinguish between forum shopping which is compliant with the acquis communautaire on the freedom of establishment across Europe and forum shopping which is fraudulent.

Despite being one of the “heavyweights” in international trade, finance and development, the European Union’s (EU) presence in the economic governance fora of the United Nations (UN) continues to be fraught with difficulties. Faced with the legal and political hurdles of multilateral diplomacy in a state-centric environment, the EU has had to deal with a lack of status and participation rights, the complexities of an internal coordination process involving 28 Member States, and the challenges of ensuring a cohesive external representation. This contribution provides a brief overview of the legal basis for EU engagement in the UN, the Union’s internal coordination process, as well as the framework governing its external representation. To highlight the patchwork of legal statuses and modes of engagement, we subsequently take a closer look at the EU’s relations with a select number of UN bodies in the area of economic governance. This allows us to illustrate the respective challenges in three scenarios: UN fora where the EU and the EU Member States hold membership rights, where we look at FAO; UN fora where the EU holds an observer or full participant status while its Member States have membership rights, where we look at ECOSOC, its subsidiary bodies, and UNCTAD; and UN fora where the EU Member States are members but where the EU has no formal status: here we look at the World Bank.

The Framework for Sustainable Food Systems law will either not be published at all or after a long delay. Whereas the first part of the article constructs an empirical and theoretical underpinning about why the EU Member States should therefore act on food sustainability, the second part focuses on what legal measures Member States can take.In the first part, leaning on food systems thinking, we argue that in the absence of EU action in the matter, the Member States remain the most potent lever for taking regulatory action on addressing sustainability in the food system.In the second part, the article provides an exploratory study of potential national legal instruments for making domestic food systems more sustainable, with an emphasis on the regulation of offer and consumption of foods and food environments. The article discusses the following legal instruments in the context of EU law and Member States’ room for action, with examples from a comparative perspective: public procurement purchasing by governments, product composition requirements, fiscal measures, non-fiscal pricing instruments, labelling & certification, marketing, and the regulation of private and public food environments. The article further concludes that it may prove useful to better enshrine the food sustainability paradigm in law at national level.

EMBO Reports (2019) e48036 The cultivation of genetically modified (GM) crops in the EU remains a highly polemic issue. The only GM crop event that is currently authorised is the insect‐resistant maize “MON810”. The GM potato variety “Amflora” with improved tuber starch composition was approved for cultivation in 2010, but later withdrawn. One of the main reasons that not more GM crops are authorised for cultivation is a regulatory gridlock with a recurring inability to reach a qualified majority in the designated committee for either approval or rejection [1]. Several EU member states experience domestic pressure against adoption of GM crops [2], [3], [4]. The European Commission (EC) therefore developed legislation—the Directive EU 2015/412, adopted by the European Parliament (EP) in 2015—to give member states the possibility to restrict or prohibit cultivation of authorised GM crops in their territory (opt‐out mechanism). The request to exclude a particular GM event from cultivation may be communicated to the EC after risk assessment, or after authorisation provided that the restriction is in conformity with the EU law, reasoned, proportional, non‐discriminatory and based on compelling grounds (Article 26b(3) of Directive 2015/412). To date, 17 member states and two autonomous regions have used this possibility. In parallel, the EC also proposed an analogous mechanism for the import of GM food and …

Territorial Conflict, Domestic Crisis, and the Covid-19 Pandemic in the South Caucasus. Explaining Variegated EU Responses.

When an urgent response in international relations is needed, the EU institutions and Member States’ governments face a deficiency of effective and practical mechanisms in security cooperation. Developing autonomous programs and concepts that address this dilemma, preventing duplication of endeavors and investments, and maximizing cost-effectiveness by broadening military-political consultations on all issues of common concern is challenging. This article analyses the path and logic of EU security integration in the recent decade. In this context, the origins and goals of the pooling and sharing concept are essential to analyze the continuity of security integration, where the Council’s introduction of Permanent Structured Cooperation in defense and security is an important step forward. Therefore, this article will investigate whether and how P&S and PESCO have been related and complemented, even though both differ in the prism of aims, logic, decision-making processes, and funding. Due to budgetary throwbacks in recent decades and the war in Ukraine intensified after February 2022, EU Member States’ governments might evaluate their approach to the level of engagement in common security programs.