The new judges are: Jiri Malenkovsky (Czech Republic), George Arestis (Cyprus), Egils Levits (Latvia), Pranas Kuris (Lithuania), Anthony Borg-Barthet (Malta), Uno Lohmus (Estonia), Endre Juhasz (Hungary), Jerzy Makarczyk (Poland), Marko Ilesic (Slovenia) and Jan Klucka (Slovakia).

The EU high court ensures EU law is interpreted and applied equally in each EU state and adjudicates disputes between EU member governments and institutions as well as businesses and individuals.

The Court is composed of one judge per member state but for the sake of efficiency in a union of 25 nations, it can sit as a “Grand Chamber” of just 11 judges.

Dr Borg Barthet was born in 1947. He received the Doctorate in Law at the Royal University of Malta in 1973, was appointed Notary to the Government in 1975 and Counsel for the Republic in 1978. He was appointed Senior Counsel for the Republic in 1979, Assistant Attorney General in 1988 and was appointed Attorney General by the President of Malta in 1989.