Belgian Koen Lenaerts elected president of EU Court of Justice for fourth time

Belgian Koen Lenaerts has been elected president of the Court of Justice of the European Union for the fourth time. His new mandate runs until October 2027.

The 69-year-old, born in Mortsel in Antwerp province, began his career at the Court of Justice as a legal secretary in 1984.

At the end of the 1980s, he briefly made a sidestep as a lawyer at the Brussels Bar, but since 1989 he has been a judge at the EU Court of Justice, first at the General Court, a part of the EU Court of Justice, since 2003 at the Court itself. On 8 October 2015, his fellow judges elected him president for the first time. His previous, third mandate expired on 6 October and his fourth mandate began on Tuesday. ​

The EU Court of Justice is composed of one judge from each member state and 11 advocates-general. They are appointed for a renewable six-year term by the member states. From among them, they elect a president for a three-year renewable term. Lenaerts was reappointed by the federal government as a judge in 2020, a mandate that also expires on 6 October 2027.

The Court of Justice is one of the European Union's most important institutions. Based in Luxembourg, the judges ensure that European law is interpreted and applied in the same way in all member states. It has had considerable influence on the development of the EU in recent decades.

^{#FlandersNewsService | Koen Lenaerts speaks in Brno, Czech Republic, September 2023 © PHOTO CTK PHOTO / PATRIK UHLIR}