21.1.2004 Official Journal of the European Union L 14/21 (Acts whose publication is not obligatory) COMMISSION COMMISSION DECISION of 22 December 2003 adopting, pursuant to Council Directive 92/43[EEC, the list of sites of Community importance for the Alpine biogeographical region (notified under document number C(2003) 4957) (2004/69/EC) THE COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES, Having regard to the Treaty establishing the European Community, Having regard to Council Directive 92/43/EEC of 21 May 1992 on the conservation of natural habitats and of wild fauna and flora ('), and in particular the third subparagraph of Article 4(2) thereof, Whereas: 1 The Alpine biogeographical region referred to in Article 1(c)(iii) of Directive 92[43[EEC, comprises the Com- munity territory of the Alps (Austria, Italy, Germany, France), the Pyrenees (France and Spain), the Apennine mountains (Italy) and the northern Fennoscandian mountains (Sweden and Finland) as specified in the biogeographical map approved on 23 October 2000 by the Habitats Committee set up under Article 20 of the Directive. For that region, lists of sites proposed as sites of Com- munity importance within the meaning of Article 1 of Directive 92[43[/EEC have been transmitted to the Commission by Austria on 24 October 2003, by Italy on 11 September 2003, by Germany on 7 November 2003, by France on 23 October 2003, by Spain on 7 March 2002 and 9 July 2002, by Finland on 9 September 2002 and by Sweden on 3 July 2002 in accordance with Article 4(1) of that Directive. The lists of proposed sites were accompanied by infor- mation on each site, supplied in the format established by Commission Decision 97/266/EC of 18 December 1996 concerning a site information format for proposed Natura 2000 sites (%). (") OJ L 206, 22.7.1992, p. 7. Directive as last amended by Directive 97/62/EC (O] L 305, 8.11.1997, p. 42). () OJL 107, 24.4.1997, p. 1. (4) That information includes the most recent and definitive map of the site transmitted by the Member State in ques- tion, the site's name, location and extent, and the data yielded by application of the criteria specified in Annex III to Directive 92/43/EEC. On the basis of the draft list drawn up by the Commis- sion in agreement with each of the Member States concerned, which also identifies sites hosting priority natural habitat types or priority species, a list of sites selected as sites of Community importance should be adopted. Knowledge of the existence and distribution of the natural habitat types and species is constantly evolving, including as a result of the surveillance in accordance with Article 11, and therefore the evaluation and selec- tion of sites at EU level was done using the best available information at present. According to the settled case-law of the Court of Justice of the European Communities ‘to produce a draft list of sites of Community importance, capable of leading to the creation of a coherent European ecological network of special areas of conservation, the Commission must have available an exhaustive list of the sites which, at national level, have an ecological interest which is rele- vant from the point of view of the directive's objective of conservation of natural habitats and wild fauna and flora. Only in that way is it possible to realise the objec- tive, in the first subparagraph of Article 3(1) of Directive 92/43[EEC, of maintaining or restoring the natural habitat types and the species' habitats concerned at a favourable conservation status in their natural range, which may lie across one or more frontiers inside the Community.’