The Basic Law strives to integrate Germany into the legal community of peaceful and free states, but does not waive the sovereignty contained in the last instance in the German constitution as a right of the people to take constitutive decisions concerning fundamental questions as its own identity. There is therefore no contradiction to the aim of openness to international law if the legislature, exceptionally, does not comply with international treaty law - accepting, however, corresponding consequences in international relations - provided this is the only way in which a violation of fundamental principles of the constitution can be averted (...) [ECJ in Kadi] has thus, in a borderline case, placed the assertion of its own identity as a legal community above the commitment that it otherwise respects. Such a legal construct is not only familiar in international legal relations as a reference to the ordre public as the boundary of a treaty commitment; it also corresponds, if used constructively, to the idea of contexts of political order which are not structured according to a strict hierarchy. It does not in any case factually contradict the objective of openness towards European law, i.e. to the participation of the Federal Republic of Germany in the building of a united Europe (...), if exceptionally, and under special and narrow conditions, the Federal Constitutional Court declares European Union law inapplicable in Germany.
Das Bundesverfassungsgericht, 2 BvE 2/08 (Lisbon decision), 30 June 2009, para. 340.
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