A European Central Bank bond-buying plan crafted at the height of the euro one crisis is in line with European law, judges from the European Court of Justice ruled yesterday, throwing their weight behind the ECB and rebuffing a German challenge.

The pro-ECB line of EU judges could set the European and German courts on a collision course.

The European Union’s top court was responding to legal action by a 35,000-strong group of sceptics from Germany including politicians and academics, who had sought to dismantle the bond-buying scheme created in 2012, but never used.

The judgment is a milestone in a long-running dispute about printing money and the limits of central bank powers between the ECB and sceptics in Germany

In a statement explaining the ruling, the court set down certain conditions, saying safeguards must be built in to ensure any such programme did not break rules that prohibit central banks from financing governments.

The judgment is a milestone in a long-running dispute about printing money and the limits of central bank powers between the ECB and sceptics in Germany, the largest of 19 states in the eurozone. It represents a victory for the ECB.

Germany’s Constitutional Court, asked to rule on complaints by the group of Eurosceptic politicians and lawyers, had said there was good reason to believe the so-called OMT (Outright Monetary Transactions) plan broke rules forbidding the ECB from funding governments.

The German court referred the case to the European court for its view but implicitly reserved the right to give its final ruling.

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