Case C‑17/16

Oussama El Dakkak
and
Intercontinental SARL

v

Administration des douanes et droits indirects

(Request for a preliminary ruling from the Cour de cassation (France))

(Reference for a preliminary ruling — Regulation (EC) No 1889/2005 — Controls of cash entering or leaving the European Union — Article 3(1) — Natural person entering or leaving the European Union — Obligation to declare — International transit area of a Member State’s airport)

Summary — Judgment of the Court (First Chamber), 4 May 2017

1. EU Treaties—Territorial scope—Application to acts of secondary legislation containing no precise delimitation—Provisions of Regulation No 1889/2005 relating to the obligation to declare certain cash sums in the airports of Member States)

   (Art. 52 TEU; Art. 355 TFEU; European Parliament and Council Directive No 1889/2005, Art. 3(1))

2. Free movement of capital and liberalisation of payments—Controls of cash entering or leaving the European Union—Regulation No 1889/2005—Obligation to declare—Territorial scope—International transit areas of the airports of Member States—Included

   (European Parliament and Council Regulation No 1889/2005, Art. 3(1) and 4(1))

1.  EU territory corresponds to the geographical space referred to in Article 52 TEU and Article 355 TFEU which define the territorial scope of the Treaties. In the absence of detail as to the territorial scope of an act of secondary legislation, that scope must be determined on the basis of those provisions, since the secondary legislation applies in principle to the same area as the Treaties themselves and applies automatically in that area (see, to that effect, judgment of 15 December 2015, Parliament and Commission v Council, C‑132/14 to C‑136/14, EU:C:2015:813, paragraphs 76 and 77).

   First of all, the airports of Member States are part of that geographical area, and therefore part of EU territory. Next, the inevitable conclusion is that the provisions of Regulation No 1889/2005 do not exclude the applicability of the obligation to declare, laid down in Article 3(1) of that regulation, in the international transit areas of those airports, any more than Article 52 TEU and Article 355 TFEU exclude those areas from the territorial scope of the treaties, or lay down any exceptions in relation to those areas. This implies that, where a natural person moves from a place which is not part of the geographical area covered by Article 52 TEU and Article 355 TFEU to a place which is part of that area, that person enters the European Union for the purposes of Article 3(1) of Regulation No 1889/2005

   (see paras 22-26)

2.  Article 3(1) of Regulation (EC) No 1889/2005 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 October 2005 on controls of cash entering or leaving the Community must be interpreted to the effect that the obligation to declare laid down in that provision is applicable in the international transit area of an airport of a Member State.

   Consequently, as the Advocate General stated in points 44 and 45 of his Opinion, it is clear from the objective pursued by Regulation No 1889/2005, from its international context and from the need to pursue the preventive and deterrent aim of the obligation to declare laid down in Article 3(1) of that regulation, that the notion of a ‘natural person entering or leaving’ the European Union, referred to in that provision, must be given a broad interpretation.

   The issue whether or not a national from a third State in the international transit area of an airport of a Member State has crossed the external border of the European Union, for the purposes of Article 4(1) of Regulation No 562/2006, is irrelevant to the previous considerations. Thus, in the absence of any express provision to that effect in either of those enactments, the interpretation of Article 3(1) of Regulation No 1889/2005 cannot depend on the interpretation of the notion of crossing an external border of the European Union for the purposes of Article 4(1) of Regulation No 562/2006.

   Having regard to all the foregoing considerations, the international transit areas of the airports of Member States must not be excluded from the scope of Article 3(1) of Regulation No 1889/2005, so that, if a natural person disembarking from an aircraft coming from a third State in an airport in the territory of a Member State and waiting in the international transit area of that airport before boarding another aircraft heading to another third State is in possession of a sum equal to or greater than EUR 10000 in cash when he enters the European Union, he is subject to the obligation to declare laid down in Article 3(1) of Regulation No 1889/2005. In that regard, it falls to the Member States to take the appropriate measures to enable the interested parties to comply with that obligation in such a way as to ensure full legal certainty.

   (see paras 34, 36, 40-43, operative part)