Brussels, Belgium. Cypriot lawyer Stephanie Laulhe-Shaelou was appointed on Friday as one of the 11 advocates-general at the European Court of Justice, replacing Nicholas Emiliou. She will serve until October 6 next year, completing the remainder of Emiliou’s term.
Laulhe-Shaelou appointment
Emiliou had originally been appointed to the post for a six-year term in October 2021. He left the role in January after being elected as a judge at the European Court of Human Rights, where he will serve a nine-year term expiring in 2035.
Laulhe-Shaelou is the head of the law school at the University of Central Lancashire’s Cyprus campus and is also an invited rule of law expert at the United Nations institute for training and research.
Koen Lenaerts reappointment
The European Council also announced on Friday that European Court of Justice president Koen Lenaerts of Belgium will be reappointed as an ECJ judge for another six-year term. The new term will begin in October next year and run until October 2033.
Lenaerts has served on the ECJ since 2003. He was vice president of the court from 2012 to 2015 before becoming president in 2015, a position he has held since then.
Reference to former ECJ president Vasilios Skouris
Lenaerts succeeded Vasilios Skouris as president of the ECJ. Skouris was recently named by the Cypriot government as one of five criminal investigators appointed to examine the findings of the anti-corruption authority’s probe into the book, Mafia State.
The book concluded, among other things, that former Cypriot president Nicos Anastasiades may be criminally liable for abuse of power.
Skouris had also become well known in Cyprus during his term as president of the ECJ over a land case involving a plot he bought near the Kyrenia district village of Lapithos in 2002, where a villa was built.
When the first crossing points between the island’s two sides opened in 2003, the land’s pre-1974 owner, Meletios Apostolides, discovered that a villa had been built on his land and took the case to the Republic of Cyprus’ Nicosia district court.