The Europa-Institut, as the editor, is the second eldest institution of its kind in Europe. More than 5.000 students from all over the world have been educated in the fields of European and International Law at the Europa-Institut since its foundation in 1951. Each year students from over 30 countries come to the one-year postgraduate master’s program “European and International Law” to study the legal, political, economic and cultural foundations of the European Union. The program is characterized by five special study units – European Integration, European Economic Law, Foreign Trade and Investment, International Dispute Resolution and European Protection of Human Rights. It provides students with great freedom of choice regarding the courses they wish to attend and offers a high degree of specialization. The program can be completed entirely in English, entirely in German or in a combination of these and results in the award of the title Master of Laws (LL.M.) to its successful participants. We decided to assemble our own collection series compiling key documents for each respective field of our LL.M. program after recognizing that existing collections do not comply with the specific requirements necessary for the successful performance of our students. In attempting to fill the gap we have published five volumes so far – “International Dispute Resolution” as volume I, “European Law” as volume II, “International Trade Law” as volume III, “Public International Law” as volume IV and “International Human Rights Law” as volume V. This fourth edition of the collection of European Law includes an up-to-date selection of the primary legislation as the supreme source of law of the European Union (EU) based on the newest consolidated versions of the Treaties and Protocols published in June 2016. We added the Council Decision amending the Act concerning the election of the Members of the European Parliament by direct universal suffrage (although it is subject to the approval by the Member States and thus not yet in force) and the new European Council Decision establishing the composition of the European Parliament for the 2019 – 2024 parliamentary term. We also included several changes and updates to a number of documents. Preface 5 This new edition comprises a comprehensive yet handy collection of relevant European Law documents from both the EU and the Council of Europe. It is addressed not only to the students in our LL.M. program but to universities in general, practitioners, policy makers and European lawyers. We thank Akad. Dir. Julia Legleitner LL.M. (programme director), Ass. iur. Christina Backes (managing editor), Dennis Traudt, Annika Blaschke (text editors) and Uwe Loebens (art editor) who have made this book possible by designing the layout, formatting and proofreading the texts. Thanks must also go to the Alumni Association of the Europa-Institut’s Law Section (EVER e.V.) for its financial support. Finally, the documents are presented in their official (consolidated) version whenever possible. Most of the materials have been taken from the online EUR-Lex website. According to Article 1(2) of the Council Regulation (EU) No 216/2013 only the Official Journal published in electronic form shall be authentic and shall produce legal effects. Furthermore, we acknowledge with thanks the permission granted by the Council of Europe to reproduce their materials. We hope that this selection of documents will prove a useful roadmap through the system of European Law for the students in our LL.M. program and beyond.weiterlesen