In the case concerned, the claimant had filed for a new passport but refused to provide his finger prints. The city of Bochum has therefore denied the issuance of the passport and the claimant filed a law suit against the city of Bochum before the Administrative Court Gelsenkirchen.The court has doubts whetherthe European Union had any legislative competence to enact rules on standards for security features and biometrics in passports and travel documents as in Reg. (EC) No 2252/2004 because there was no direct relation of such rules to the protection and securitiy of EU external frontiers;these rules would comply with the right to privacy as protected by Art. 8 of the European Convention on HumanRights and the protection of personal dataand referred to the Court of the European Union the question:”Is Article 1(2) of Council Regulation (EC) No 2252/2004 of 13 December 2004, as amended by Regulation (EC) No 444/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 6 May 2009, valid?”Case C-291/12, Michael Schwarz v. Bochum
