Page 214 - Секретаријат за законодавство

INTRODUCTION
Republic of Macedonia in its process of integration in the European
Union, in addition to fulÞlling the Copenhagen political and economic cri-
teria, should approximate the national legislation with the EU law, i.e. EU
Acquis. The EU Acquis is a legal system of the European Union that con-
tains all common values acquired since the Community existence as of the
Treaties Establishment such as the Treaty Establishing European Coal and
Steel Community of 1951, the Treaty Establishing the European Atomic
Energy Community (EURATOM) of 1957 and the Treaty Establishing
the European Economic Community as of 1957 as well as the following
Treaties amending the existing Treaties such as the Single European Act
(SEA) of 1986, Treaty of Maastricht as of 1992, Treaty of Amsterdam as
of 1997, Treaty of Nice as of 2000 and the Treaty of Lisbon of 2007, and
to the legal acts adopted by the European Union Institutions and the case
law created by the European Court of Justice. This Handbook is aimed at
creating a practical tool focused to general characteristics of the European
Union legal system in order to explain the basic principles it is found-
ed and functions on. We therefore consider that this Handbook will pro-
vide initial bases necessary for all entities included in the harmonization
and approximation process of the national legislation with the European
Union law, in particular for the sectoral ministries mostly burdened by the
tasks in this process. We hope that it will also serve to the other state ad-
ministrative bodies, which are engaged or support this process in any way.
The criterion for integration in the European Union in terms of assum-
ing and implementing the EU Ⱥcquis, in fact, implies assuming the
“common values”, for which knowledge of the European Union law
is required, in particular the provisions that are directly applied in the
territory of the European Union Member States, assuming particular
provisions in the national legal system subordinate to the obligations
deriving from the European Union membership, and knowledge of the
case law of the European Court of Justice, rulings of which are consid-
ered as formal source of the European Union Law.

For proper approximation of the legislation of the Republic of Mace-
donia with the EU legislation this Handbook offers preview of the
changes introduced by entering into force of the Treaty of Lisbon. This
Handbook also gives an overview of the general principles of the EU

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