By Simon Zekaria - 11th December 2003
Europe’s lower court on Thursday backed the European Commission for imposing fines on a Greek-Italian shipping cartel in 1998.
The EU executive fined seven shipping firms a total of €9 million for collusive price-fixing on ‘roll-on-roll-off’ ferry services and the transportation of goods vehicles between the two countries.
The European Court of First Instance in Luxembourg agreed that the “agreements in question distorted competition in the common market” and that the commission had “not exceeded its powers” in issuing the sanctions.
In the judgment the court also said that liability for the fixing could not be passed onto national authorities.
Five of the implicated firms - Marlines, Ventouris Group, Adriatica di Navigazione, Strintzis Lines Shipping and Minoan Lines – appealed against the fines to the CFI.
But EU competition officials are not completely vindicated by the verdict.
The CFI reduced the fine for Ventouris and Adriatica after assessing Brussels had wrongly charged the shippers for two offences instead of one.
An appeal on the CFI verdict can be brought to Europe’s higher court, the European Court of Justice, within two months.
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