No L 127/32 Official Journal of the European Communities 19. §. 94 COMMISSION DECISION of 27 April 1994 on a procedure relating to the application of Council Regulation (EEC) No 2408/92 (Case VII/AMA/IV/93 — TAT — Paris(Orly)-Marseille and Paris(Orly)-Toulouse) (Only the French text is authentic) (94/291/EC) THE COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES, Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community, Having regard to Council Regulation (EEC) No 2408/92 of 23 July 1992, on access for Community air carriers to intra-Community air routes (*), and in particular Article 8 (3) thereof, ‘ After consulting the Advisory Committee, Whereas : BACKGROUND I On 28 September 1993 TAT European Airlines (whose registered office is at 47, rue Christiaan Huygens, 37100 Tours, France) requested the Commission to: (i) find that, by refusing TAT European Airlines a licence to operate on the Paris-Toulouse and Paris-Marseille routes to and from Orly airport, the French authorities and the Air France Group infringed Council Regula- tion (EEC) No 2408/92; (ii) take all necessary steps to put an end to repeated viol- ations and abuse by the authorities and the group concerned and to give the measures in question their full effect. By letter of 21 June 1993 the General Manager of TAT European Airlines (hereinafter referred to as “TAT’) asked the Director-General of Civil Aviation in the French Ministry of Transport to clarify the position of his admi- nistration with regard to operation on the Paris(Orly)- Toulouse and Paris(Orly)-Marseille routes by TAT, routes on which his company had applied to operate. The letter () OJ No L 240, 24. 8. 1992, p. 8. made explicit reference to the provisions of Regulation (EEC) No 2408/92, which applied from 1 January 1993, and in particular Article 8 of that Regulation. In a letter dated 21 July the Director-General of Civil Aviation replied that he was unable to grant TAT’s appli- cation, basing his refusal on Article 5 of the above Regu- lation. The Director-General of Civil Aviation wrote : ‘Article 5 of this Regulation allows the exclusive conces- sion granted on these routes by virtue of the agreement between the State and Air Inter to be maintained for three years with effect from 1 January 1993. At the current time the Minister has decided to take advantage of this possibi- lity for a large part of the Air Inter network, including the routes in question. I cannot therefore grant your request.’ The complaint formally recorded was lodged with the Commission by TAT on 28 September 1993 and by the Commission’s Directorate-General for Transport on 29 September, disputes the French authorities’ refusal of 21 July 1993. II In support of its complaint to the Commssion, TAT claimed that there was an infringement of Articles 3 (f), 86 and 90 of the EC Treaty, failure to comply with the Agreement of 30 October 1990 between the Commission of the European Communities, the French Government and Air Prance following the latter’s takeover of UTA (Union des Transports Aériens), and an infringement of Regulation (EEC) No 2408/92. The various submissions made by TAT include the following which are pertinent to this Decision : — French domestic traffic rights for flights out of Paris are normally granted by the French authorities for all airports in the Paris airport system designated for the operation of scheduled traffic rights, namely Orly and Charles de Gaulle (CDG). As far as domestic services are concerned, the French authorities want to encou-