Misiūnas appeals ruling upholding Nausėda’s decision

Former interior minister Eimutis Misiūnas has appealed a Vilnius Regional Court ruling that found President Gitanas Nausėda was justified in refusing to appoint him as a judge, LRT reported.

Misiūnas said on Thursday that he had prepared an appeal against the court’s August 21 decision. He argued that the court wrongly endorsed the president’s position that he needed a period of political cooling off after taking part in the 2020 parliamentary elections before being appointed as a judge.

According to Misiūnas, the court provided neither specific criteria nor evidence to explain why the 106 days between his participation in the election and the proposed appointment were insufficient.

He also said the court had unjustifiably treated his participation in the election as a greater threat to judicial political neutrality than his service as a minister and deputy minister during the 2016 to 2020 government. He is asking for the ruling to be overturned.

The proceedings were reopened on the instruction of the Supreme Court of Lithuania after it took into account a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that favoured Misiūnas last October.

National courts had previously refused to accept Misiūnas’s lawsuit, finding that some of his claims could not be examined by a court and that other parts had formal deficiencies he had not corrected within the deadline.

The European Court of Human Rights found a violation and awarded Misiūnas 10,000 euros in compensation for non pecuniary damage from the state.

Misiūnas filed the case after Nausėda rejected his December 2020 request for appointment as a judge. Two years later, the president agreed to return him to the judiciary but again did not appoint him, citing the need for political cooling off. Misiūnas, who had served as interior minister and deputy defence minister from 2016 to 2020, said he viewed the president’s actions as persecution for exercising freedom of speech.