Grand Chamber judgment concerning San Marino
In the case of Fabbri and Others v. San Marino the Court held that there had been no violation of the right of access to court as concerned one of the applicants and declared inadmissible the complaints brought by the remaining two applicants.
The case concerned three individuals who participated in criminal proceedings as victims of alleged offences. They complained that they could not have their civil claims adjudicated in those proceedings because delays in the investigations had led to the alleged offences becoming time-barred in 2020.
The Court found no violation of the right of access to court as concerned one of the three applicants who had requested to join the proceedings as a civil party, but had not pursued his claim diligently and had other avenues open to him. It rejected as inadmissible the remaining two applicants’ complaints because they had not lodged a formal request via a signed declaration to obtain the status of “civil party”, as was required under San Marino law.
Chamber News
In the case of T.V. v. Spain the Court held that there had been a violation of the prohibition of slavery and forced labour.
The case concerned a victim of human trafficking from Nigeria to Spain. She alleged that the Spanish authorities’ investigation into her criminal complaint of human trafficking and sexual exploitation had been inadequate.
The Court found that no measures had been taken at all in the first two years of the investigation; that the investigators had failed to pursue obvious lines of enquiry; and, that the decisions to provisionally dismiss her case had been superficial and insufficiently reasoned. Such shortcomings showed a blatant disregard for the duty to investigate serious allegations of human trafficking, an offence with devastating consequences for its victims.
In the case of Validity Foundation on behalf of T.J. v. Hungary the Court held that there had been two violations of the right to life/investigation.
The case concerned the death of a woman with a severe intellectual disability in a State-run social-care home and the ensuing investigation into the allegation that she had died of neglect.
The Court noted that understaffing, insufficient medical and therapeutic care, inappropriate living conditions and excessive use of restraining measures against residents had already been recorded at this care home. At least ten residents had died at the home that year. The authorities had therefore been aware of the alarming conditions before she died. Their response, however, both in terms of preventing the deterioration in her health and her untimely death as well as in terms of the ensuing investigation had been inadequate.
In the case of Micha and Others v. Greece the Court held that there had been a violation of the right to a fair hearing within a reasonable time and a violation of the right to an effective remedy, in conjunction with the right to protection of property.
The case concerned the restriction on the applicants’ use of their land as a result of a proposed amendment to the urban development plan under which it would be turned into a green belt, and the authorities’ refusal to comply with the judgments delivered by the administrative courts in that connection.
The Court observed that the applicants’ use of their land had been restricted in the form of a series of decisions, rearrangements and reclassifications adopted by the different authorities. The Supreme Administrative Court’s judgment in favour of the applicants and the decisions of that court’s three-judge panel responsible for supervising the enforcement of its judgments had been fruitless.
The applicants had therefore been unable to have the expropriation decisions against them set aside, the restrictions on the use of their land lifted or their properties reclassified as building land. That situation also revealed the lack of an effective remedy by which to impel the authorities to comply with the judicial decisions concerning the applicants’ property.
In the case of M.A. and Z.R. v. Cyprus the Court held that there had been, on account of the applicants’ return to Lebanon, a violation of the prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment, a violation of the prohibition of collective expulsion of aliens, a violation of the right to an effective remedy and, on account of the applicants’ treatment by the Cypriot authorities, a violation of the prohibition of torture.
The case concerned the interception of Syrian nationals at sea by the Cypriot authorities and their immediate return to Lebanon, where they had already spent four years in a refugee camp after they had fled Syria because of the civil war there, the targeting of civilians and the destruction of their homes. The applicants maintained that they were asylum-seekers and had stated that they wished to seek asylum in Cyprus, whereas the Cypriot Government had treated them as economic migrants.
The Court found that the Cypriot authorities had essentially returned the applicants to Lebanon without processing their asylum claims and without all the steps required under the Refugee Law.
In the case of Severin v. Romania the Court held that there had been no violation of the right to a fair trial/right to examine witnesses.
The case concerned the fairness of criminal proceedings against the applicant for allegedly taking bribes while he was a Member of the European Parliament. The proceedings, which saw him receive a four-year prison sentence, were initiated following the publication of an article by two British Sunday Times journalists, who had posed as lobbyists and had offered the applicant money in exchange for his support for certain legislative amendments submitted to the European Parliament.
The Court noted that there was no evidence of State involvement in the present case and that the two journalists had acted at all times as private individuals. As to the criminal proceedings as a whole, the Court considered that they had afforded the applicant adequate safeguards to exercise his defence rights. The Court further considered that the way in which the witnesses had been examined during the proceedings was also compatible with that provision, and had enabled the applicant to exercise his rights effectively.
- Press release
- Press release (Romanian)
Grand Chamber News
The Court has accepted the referral to the Grand Chamber of the case Tsaava and Others v. Georgia.
The case concerns the dispersal of a protest in 2019 from the front of the Parliament building in Tbilisi. The applicants were either participants in the demonstration, or journalists reporting on the protests. They allege, in particular, excessive use of force by the authorities resulting in their injury.
The Court has also decided to reject a request to refer twelve other cases.
The Court will be delivering a Grand Chamber ruling in the case of Fabbri and Others v. San Marino on 24 September 2024.
The case concerns delays in separate criminal investigations resulting in the alleged offences becoming time-barred.
In the case of Pindo Mulla v. Spain the Court held that there had been a violation of the right to respect for private and family life read in the light of the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.
The case concerned blood transfusions administered to the applicant, a Jehovah’s Witness, during emergency surgery, despite her refusal to undergo a blood transfusion of any kind.
The Court found that the authorisation to proceed with that treatment had resulted from a decision-making process that had been affected by the omission of essential information about the documenting of the applicant’s wishes, which had been recorded in various forms and at various times in writing. Since neither the applicant nor anyone connected with her had been made aware of the decision taken by the duty judge authorising all treatment, it had not been possible to rectify that omission. Neither this issue nor the issue of her capacity to take a decision had been addressed in an adequate manner in the subsequent proceedings. The national system had therefore not responded adequately to her complaint that her wishes had been wrongly overruled.
Hearings
The Court held a Grand Chamber hearing in the case of Mansouri v. Italy.
The case concerns the lawfulness and conditions of a Tunisian national’s confinement on board the ship being used to return him to his country of origin on the basis of a refusal-of-entry order issued by the border police.
Decisions
The Court declared inadmissible the application in the case of Missaoui and Akhandaf v. Belgium.
The case concerned two applicants who complained that they had been prohibited from entering a public swimming pool in Antwerp while wearing burkinis, on the basis of a municipal by-law. In the domestic proceedings, the applicants did not lodge an appeal on points of law because a lawyer at the Court of Cassation had given a negative opinion on the chances of lodging a successful appeal.
The Court noted that the Court of Cassation had never ruled on the lawfulness of a judicial decision concerning the wearing of a burkini at a public swimming pool. It also observed that there appeared to be divergent case-law on the matter in the lower courts in Belgium. In consequence, the Court considered that the single negative opinion from a lawyer at the Court of Cassation was not, in the circumstances of the case, a valid reason for exempting the applicants from lodging an appeal on points of law with the Court of Cassation.
The Court declared inadmissible the application in the case of Morelli v. Italy.
The case concerned the obligation for self-employed people who are the commercial managers of their company to register in two separate social-security schemes of the Istituto Nazionale della Previdenza Sociale.
The Court, in rejecting the case, held that the legislature’s intervention clarifying that people in the applicant’s situation had to pay into both social-security schemes had been foreseeable and justified on compelling grounds of general interest – protection of the State’s financial stability, offsetting of the unexpected effects of the Court of Cassation’s judgment of 12 February 2010, and restoration of legal certainty by the re-establishment of the settled administrative practice.
Communication of cases
The Court has communicated to the Government of Türkiye five cases covering 1,000 other applications.
The applications concern convictions for membership of an armed terrorist organisation, based on the alleged use of the encrypted messaging application called ByLock.
The core issues raised by the applicants have already been judged in the Court’s Grand Chamber case Yüksel Yalçınkaya v. Türkiye. In that judgment the Court highlighted that there were over 8,000 applications on the Court’s docket involving similar complaints. These 1,000 apparently comparable applications are the third batch to be notified to the Turkish Government. Against that background, the Court decided not to put any questions to the parties or to require any observations on the applications.
Other News
On 10 October 2024, the President of the Court, Marko Bošnjak, attended the annual conference of the European Law Institute (ELI) in Dublin, where he took part in the keynote panel with Michael O’Flaherty, Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe, Rossa Fanning, SC, Attorney General of Ireland, Pascal Pichonnaz, President of the European Law Institute, and Owen Bowcott, journalist.
On 7 October 2024, the President of the ECHR, Marko Bošnjak, attended a formal sitting of the Court of Justice of the European Union in Luxembourg. He also held a bilateral meeting with Koen Lenaerts, President of the Court of Justice.
On 4 October 2024, the President of the Court, Marko Bošnjak, attended the Conference of the Network of the Presidents of the Supreme Judicial Courts of the European Union, in Athens. He was accompanied by Ioannis Ktistakis, Judge elected in respect of Greece.
On 4 October 2024, the President of the Court, Marko Bošnjak, held a bilateral meeting with Kyriakos Mitsotakis, Prime Minister of Greece, in Athens. He was accompanied by Ioannis Ktistakis, Judge elected in respect of Greece.