European Union – VAT. Th Court of Justice of the European Union gave preliminary ruling in which it decided that EU law, in particular art 4(3) of the Treaty on the European Union and arts 2 and 22 of the Sixth Council Directive (EEC) 77/388 should be interpreted to the effect that it did not preclude VAT debts from being declared irrecoverable under national legislation, such as that at issue in the main proceedings, providing for a bankruptcy discharge procedure by means of which a court could, under certain conditions, declare irrecoverable the debts of a natural person which had not been settled by the close of the bankruptcy proceedings initiated against that person.