BNS: Lithuania expects Brussels to shelve case over professionals' mobility
Updated 2008-11-27
VILNIUS, Nov 27, BNS - The European Commission is taking action against Lithuania and three other member states for failure to transpose into national law certain EU legislation aimed at facilitating mobility within the internal market for qualified people moving to another member state either to work or to settle there permanently.
However, Lithuanian officials believe that the case against Lithuania should be terminated, saying that the failure to notify was due to technical errors.
The European Commission has decided to bring a legal action before the European Court of Justice against Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and the Netherlands "for failure to notify measures for the transposition of Directive 2005/36/EC on the recognition of professional qualifications," the
EU's executive body said in a press release on Thursday.
Birute Kinduriene, the national coordinator for the recognition of professional qualifications, told BNS that Lithuania had adopted all legislation needed to comply with the provisions of the directive on professional qualifications. The last pieces of the required legislation were adopted last month.
"The problem arose because an order on pharmacists' qualifications issued in April by the director of the Pharmacy Department under the Health Ministry had not been notified to the electronic database," she said.
The order was published in the official bulletin Valstybes Zinios on Thursday and is already available in the database. Therefore, the case against Lithuania should be terminated, the coordinator said.
Jurgis Vilcinskas, the head of the press and information office of the European Commission's Representation in Lithuania, told BNS that the average
length of proceedings at the Court of Justice was 23 months.
"There will be a decision. If Lithuania refused to comply with [the court's decision], then it would face financial sanctions," the official said.
If Lithuania lost its case in the Court of Justice and refused to comply with the court's decision, it would face a minimum fine of 545,000 euros, he said.
