The European Commission on Wednesday announced new measures aimed at protecting the rule of law in EU member states, according to Politico.
The package, whose central feature is an annual EU-wide rule-of-law review, is meant to reinforce existing mechanisms.
Brussels has struggled to address concerns of democratic backsliding in some of its member countries. The EU’s formal mechanism for tackling rule-of law problems, Article 7, was launched against Poland and Hungary, but has stalled in practice.
A Commission proposal to link EU funding to rule-of-law criteria, meanwhile, has run into legal hurdles and fierce political opposition from some member governments.
The new initiatives, coming toward the end of the Commission’s term, are designed to address these concerns while also placating those critics who say that some countries are being targeted more than others in EU rule-of-law probes.
These initiatives correspond with Priority 1 for the Croatian presidency of the Council of the EU defined by Croatian civil society organizations gathered in Forum 2020 platform.
