M.S.S. v. BELGIUM AND GREECE JUDGMENT 15 the taking of responsibility for an asylum application and the calculation of the deadline for making the transfer where the legislation of the requesting member State provided for appeals to have suspensive effect. The CJEC found that time started to run following the decision on the merits of the request. 82. The CJEU has recently received a request from the Court of Appeal (United Kingdom) for a preliminary ruling on the interpretation to be given to the sovereignty clause in the Dublin Regulation (N.S. and Others, case C-411/10). (b) The European Union’s directives on asylum matters 83. Three other European texts supplement the Dublin Regulation. 84. Council Directive 2003/9/EC of 27 January 2003 laying down minimum standards for the reception of asylum-seekers in the member States (“the Reception Directive”), came into force on 6 February 2003, the day of its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJ 2003 L 31 p. 18). It requires the member States to guarantee asylumseekers: – certain material reception conditions, including housing, food and clothing, in kind or in the form of financial allowances; the allowances must be sufficient to protect the asylum-seeker from extreme need; – arrangements to maintain family unity; – medical and psychological care; and – access for minors to the education system, and to language classes where necessary for them to undergo normal schooling. In 2007 the European Commission asked the CJEC (now the CJEU) to examine whether Greece was fulfilling its obligations concerning the reception of refugees. In a judgment of 19 April 2007 (Case C-72/06 Commission v. Greece), the CJEC found that Greece had failed to fulfil its obligations under the Reception Directive. The Greek authorities subsequently transposed the Reception Directive. On 3 November 2009 the European Commission sent a letter to Greece announcing that it was bringing new proceedings against it. 85. Council Directive 2005/85/EC of 1 December 2005 on minimum standards on procedures in member States for granting and withdrawing refugee status (“the Procedures Directive”), which came into force on 13 December 2005, the day of its publication in the Official Journal (OJ 2005 L 326 p. 13), guarantees the rights listed below. – An application for asylum cannot be rejected on the sole ground that it has not been made as soon as possible. In addition, applications shall be examined individually, objectively and impartially. – Asylum applicants have the right to remain in the member State pending the outcome of the examination of their application.

Select target paragraph3