European Union – Reference to European Court. The Court of Justice of the European Union held that EU law had to be interpreted as precluding national legislation under which ordinary courts were under a duty, if they considered a national statute to be contrary to art 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, to apply to the constitutional court for that statute to be generally struck down, to the extent that the priority nature of that procedure prevented all the other national courts or tribunals from exercising their right of fulfilling their obligation to refer questions to the Court for a preliminary ruling. Further, an appearance entered by a representative in absentia did not amount to an appearance being entered by a defendant for the purposes of art 24 of the Council Regulation (EC) 44/2001.