Judicial Power

The constitutionally established Judicial system of Greece consists of two jurisdictions, the administrative and the civil/criminal, which are in turn organized in three instances: the courts of first instance (lower courts), the courts of appeals (higher, appellate courts) and the Supreme Courts.

The Council of State (Symvoulio tis Epikrateias), which is the Supreme Administrative Court of Greece, the Supreme Civil and Criminal Court (Areios Pagos), and the Court of Audit (Elegktiko Synedrio), which has jurisdiction on the audit of the expenditures of the State, local government agencies and other legal entities, are the country’s highest courts.

Greek judges belong to one of these two jurisdictions; thus, an administrative judge is not entitled to judge a penal or civil case, while a civil judge is not entitled to judge an administrative case.