CCF: Commission for the Control of INTERPOL’s Files

CFR: Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union

CJEU: Court of Justice of the European Union

EAW: European Arrest Warrant

EAW FD: Council Framework Decision 2002/584/JHA on the European Arrest Warrant and the surrender procedures between Member States (13th June 2002)

ESL: Lawyer in the Executing State

ISL: Lawyer in the Issuing State

ECHR: European Convention on Human Rights

ECtHR: European Court of Human Rights

TEU: Treaty on European Union

TFEU: Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union )

This handbook is designed to assist defence lawyers who have been instructed or assigned to act for a requested person in European Arrest Warrant (EAW) proceedings both in the Issuing and Executing Member States.

The handbook aims to provide practical answers for defence lawyers with little time and pending EAW proceedings.

It is primarily intended as a resource for lawyers who have had little experience of these proceedings and are unfamiliar with how to defend an EAW case.

As this is a preliminary guide, we provide brief and easy-to-follow explanations and summaries of the relevant EU law. Defence practitioners should be aware that national law and national jurisprudence may provide additional options in defending an EAW case.