EU court says no need to adjudicate on Bank Mellat’s case post JCPOA

The Court of Justice has rejected Bank Mellat’s appeal in its case seeking to challenge not the targeted asset freeze on it (on which it succeeded – see previous blog), but the wider restrictions on Iranian banks that had been imposed by EU sanctions pre-JCPOA. Judgment here. The ECJ has held that Bank Mellat had no continuing interest in the case because the JCPOA lifted the banking restrictions it was challenging (the court distinguished the Abdulrahim cases concerning targeted asset freeze challenges).

The lower court had held (see previous blog) some of the application inadmissible on jurisdictional grounds and rejected other parts on the grounds that the restrictions had a valid legal basis and were proportionate.  We reported on Advocate General Mengozzi’s opinion in June this year (see previous blog).