12 AUAD v. BULGARIA JUDGMENT procedures in Member States for returning illegally staying third-country nationals (see paragraphs 46-48 below), detention may be maintained as long as the conditions laid down in subsection 6 are in place, but not longer than six months. Exceptionally, if a deportee refuses to cooperate with the authorities, or there are delays in the obtaining of the necessary travel documents, or the deportee represents a national security or public order risk, detention may be prolonged for a further twelve months, to a maximum of eighteen months. 45. Section 46a provides for judicial review of the orders for the detention of deportees by the competent administrative courts. The application must be lodged within three days of their being issued, and does not stay their enforcement (subsection 1). The court must examine the application at a public hearing and rule, by means of a final judgment, not later than one month after the proceedings were instituted (subsection 2). In addition, every six months the head of any facility where deportees are being held must present to the court a list of all individuals who have been there for more than six months due to problems with their removal from the country (subsection 3). The court must then rule, on its own motion and by means of a final decision, on their continued detention or release (subsection 4). When the court sets aside the detention order, or orders a deportee’s release, he or she must be set free immediately (subsection 5). III. RELEVANT EUROPEAN UNION LAW 46. Directive 2008/115/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 December 2008 on common standards and procedures in Member States for returning illegally staying third-country nationals came into force on 13 January 2009 (Article 22). Under Article 20, the Member States of the European Union were required to transpose the bulk of its provisions in their national laws by 24 December 2009. 47. Recital 16 of the Directive reads as follows: “The use of detention for the purpose of removal should be limited and subject to the principle of proportionality with regard to the means used and objectives pursued. Detention is justified only to prepare the return or carry out the removal process and if the application of less coercive measures would not be sufficient.” 48. Article 15 of the Directive, which governs detention for the purpose of removal, provides, in so far as relevant: “1. Unless other sufficient but less coercive measures can be applied effectively in a specific case, Member States may only keep in detention a third-country national who is the subject of return procedures in order to prepare the return and/or carry out the removal process, in particular when: (a) there is a risk of absconding or