Summary

(Appeal - State aid - Articles 107 and 108 TFEU - Bilateral Investment Treaty - Arbitration clause - Romania - Accession to the European Union - Repeal of a tax incentives scheme prior to accession - Arbitral award granting payment of damages after accession - European Commission decision declaring that payment to be State aid incompatible with the internal market and ordering its recovery - Competence of the European Commission - Application ratione temporis of EU law - Determination of the date at which the right to receive aid is conferred on the beneficiary - Article 19 TEU - Articles 267 and 344 TFEU - Autonomy of EU law)

The General Court erred in law in finding that the Commission lacked competence to examine, in the light of the law on State aid, the compensation paid to Swedish investors by Romania in implementation of an arbitral award.

While that award had upheld the argument of those investors that that Member State had unlawfully repealed a tax incentives scheme before its accession to the European Union, the aid measure referred to by the Commission was nevertheless granted after that accession.