Mugabe ally loses EU sanctions compensation case

17      It should be noted in that regard that, in order for the European Union to incur non-contractual liability under the second paragraph of Article 340 TFEU for unlawful conduct on the part of its institutions, a number of conditions must be satisfied: the institutions’ conduct must be unlawful; actual damage must have been suffered; and there must be a causal link between the conduct alleged and the damage pleaded. The cumulative nature of those three conditions governing the establishment of non-contractual liability means that, if one of them is not satisfied, the action for damages must be dismissed in its entirety, and there is no need to examine the other conditions (see judgment of 23 November 2011 in Sison v Council, T‑341/07, EU:T:2011:687, paragraphs 28 and 29 and the case-law cited).

18      With regard to the first applicant’s claim for compensation for the non-material damage he claims to have suffered, it is necessary to examine, first of all, the problems raised by the issue of whether the conduct adopted by the Council and the Commission towards that applicant was lawful. The Council’s arguments concerning whether the action is inadmissible or manifestly unfounded in the light of the evidence annexed to the application must be rejected, at the very least in so far as concerns the non-material damage alleged by the first applicant, as sufficient evidence describing circumstances that could justify such a claim has been put forward in the case. In that context, if it is established that those institutions have not acted unlawfully vis-à-vis the first applicant, the action will have to be dismissed in its entirety in relation to all the applicants, because the reason for the listings at issue is the inclusion of the first applicant on the list of persons referred to in Article 6 of Regulation No 314/2004.

19      The Commission, for its part, makes the preliminary point that the fourth applicant has never been subject to restrictive measures, so that the application must be dismissed as inadmissible as regards that applicant.

20      As stated in paragraph 6 above, the fourth applicant claims to be the legal successor to Breco International (Private), which was added, under the name ‘Breco International’, to the list of legal persons, entities or bodies referred to in Article 6 of Annex III to Regulation No 314/2004 under Article 1 of and the Annex to Regulation No 77/2009. It should be noted in that regard that item 7 of Part II of that annex indicates that Breco International is a legal person established in St Helier (Jersey). According to the explanations given by the Council at the hearing, the existence of such an entity based in Jersey was ascertained from a report by a company search agency annexed to the Council’s rejoinder. According to a change of name certificate issued by the Zimbabwean Register of Companies on 29 September 2010, which was produced by the applicants in connection with the regularisation of the application, the fourth applicant is the Zimbabwean company Breco International (Private) Ltd, which then became Fodya (Private) Ltd. Against that background, first, it is clear that the inclusion of Breco International on the lists in question was not based on evidence of the existence in law of that entity emanating from the Zimbabwean Register of Companies. Second, there is no evidence from which it may be inferred that, by including Breco International on those lists, the institutions concerned intended to add to the lists the name of the fourth applicant, which is established in Harare (Zimbabwe) and whose identification details therefore differ significantly from those of Breco International. Accordingly, the applicants are incorrect to claim that the name of the fourth applicant was included on the lists in question.

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