Op-Ed: “Defining ‘Emergency Situations’ Justifying the Accommodation of Returnees in Prisons – the Court of Justice’s Judgment in the Landkreis Case Enhances the Right to Liberty and Judicial Review” by Madalina Moraru

At a time when emergency laws have become the norm in policy-making, on 10th March, the Court of Justice delivered a landmark judgment in the Landkreis case clarifying the conditions for the application of the emergency clause under the Return Directive (Article 18). This case is of importance not only for migration scholars but more widely for constitutional and EU law scholars, as the Court of Justice sets limits to the executive’s use or abuse of emergency clauses in order to justify limitations of fundamental rights (in casu the right to liberty and human dignity of returnees). Moreover, the Landkreis judgment fills some gaps in the Return Directive (‘RD’) by providing a definition of the terms ‘specialised facility’ for the pre-remo