European Commissioner for Crisis Management, Janez Lenarcic, recommended that Croatia and Slovenia should together approach the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) over their ongoing dispute. Lenarcic's idea comes after CJEU had ruled last week that it has no jurisdiction to decide Slovenia's case against Croatia, which claims Croatia's refusal to implement an arbitration ruling is in breach of EU law.

Lenarcic, Slovenia’s former ambassador to the EU, believes that the dispute could still be presented before the court in Luxembourg if Croatia agreed with it.

“The court could be asked a very simple question: is the arbitration award binding on both parties. Slovenia is confident that it is, while Croatia is opposed to it. Let the court then give its opinion on the matter,” Lenarcic told Slovenian news agency STA on Monday.

Last week the EU court decided that it has no jurisdiction to rule on Slovenia’s action, saying that the border issue is a matter of international law and not EU law. The ruling is final and Slovenia cannot appeal it.

Lenarcic warned that the president of the EU court, speaking to Slovenian and Croatia media nearly two years ago, before Slovenia had decided to turn to the court, said that Slovenia was using a wrong mechanism for its action.

The President of the Court of Justice of the EU, Koen Lenaerts, told the Ljubljana-based Dnevnik newspaper that the subject matter of the Slovenian lawsuit did not fall within the scope of European law which the court deals with.

He warned that proceedings could be conducted under Article 273 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, under which the court can, subject to an agreement between parties, address an issue even if it does not concern EU law, but is important for the functioning of the EU and its member states.

Lenaerts said then that lawsuits between EU member states were very rare, and added that Slovenia and Croatia could resolve their dispute in a similar way Austria and Germany had when they requested an opinion from the EU Court on financial issues over which they disagreed.