Judgment_paragraph 53 · European Ombudsman v Claire Staelen (C-337/15 P)

53As regards the admissibility of the second, third and fourth parts of the first ground of appeal, it is important to note that, according to the settled case-law of the Court of Justice, it is clear from the second subparagraph of Article 256(1) TFEU and the first paragraph of Article 58 of the Statute of the Court of Justice of the European Union that the General Court has exclusive jurisdiction, first, to find the facts, except where the substantive inaccuracy of its findings is apparent from the documents submitted to it, and, second, to assess those facts. By contrast, when the General Court has found or assessed the facts, the Court of Justice has jurisdiction to review the legal characterisation of those facts by the General Court and the legal conclusions it has drawn from them (see, in particular, judgment of 3 September 2009, Moser Baer India v Council, C‑535/06 P, EU:C:2009:498, paragraph 31 and the case-law cited). Thus, the Court of Justice has repeatedly observed that the question whether the General Court could, properly in law, conclude from those facts that the EU institutions had failed in their duty to act diligently is a question of law subject to the review of the Court of Justice on appeal (see, in particular, judgment of 3 September 2009, Moser Baer India v Council, C‑535/06 P, EU:C:2009:498, paragraph 34 and the case-law cited). The same applies when determining whether such a failure is, moreover, to be classified as a ‘sufficiently serious breach’ of EU law, and one that may give rise to the European Union’s non-contractual liability.