Court delegation visits Athens
On 22 and 23 October 2026, a delegation of judges of the Court and its Registrar, led by President Mattias Guyomar, visited Athens for meetings with Greece's superior courts and participation in two events.
On 22 October, the delegation held a bilateral meeting with a delegation of Greece’s Council of State, led by its President Michalis Pikramenos, while on 23 October they met with the President Panagiotis Lymperopoulos and judges of Greece’s Court of Cassation. The discussions, which formed part of the Court’s continuing judicial dialogue with national superior courts, focused on the principle of shared responsibility in implementing the European Convention on Human Rights.
On 23 October, the Court delegation also attended the presentation of the proceedings of the commemorative event Strengthening Democracy: 50 Years since the Re-ratification of the European Convention on Human Rights and 75 Years since the Founding of the Council of Europe, organised by the Council of State and attended by H.E. the President of the Hellenic Republic, Constantine An. Tassoulas, and other senior State officials. Addressing the participants, the President of the Court highlighted that the democratic ideal lies at the heart of both the Convention and the Court’s case-law, adding that democracy and the protection of fundamental rights are mutually reinforcing. The publication was presented by Ioannis Ktistakis, Section President and judge elected in respect of Greece, who served as scientific editor of the volume. On the sidelines of the presentation, President Guyomar, Judge Ktistakis and Registrar Tsirli had the opportunity to meet with the President of the Hellenic Republic.
On 22 October, the delegation also participated in the Christos Rozakis Workshop entitled Greece and the Strasbourg Court. Ioannis Ktistakis, Section President and judge elected in respect of Greece, delivered the introductory remarks, while President Mattias Guyomar and the Registrar of the Court, Marialena Tsirli, took part in a discussion on the contemporary challenges facing the European Court of Human Rights, chaired by former Court President Linos-Alexandre Sicilianos. In his speech, the President of the Court elaborated on three challenges: armed conflicts, threats to democracy and the rule of law, and the application of the living instrument doctrine in a context of political pressure. The Registrar of the Court, focused on the operational challenges faced by the Court, including the massive influx of applications, insufficient financial resources; and the impact of new technologies, such as artificial intelligence, on the work of the Court.
Chamber News
Court of Cassation did not lack impartiality in Silvio Berlusconi’s conviction proceedings.
In the case of Berlusconi v. Italy the Court held that there had been no violation of the right to a fair trial in respect of the complaint that the Court of Cassation had lacked impartiality.
The case concerned the applicant’s complaint of unfairness regarding his criminal conviction for a tax evasion scheme implemented through Mediaset S.p.A. and other companies in the same group, in connection with the purchase of television rights.
The Court found that the applicant had not shown that the bench of the Court of Cassation dealing with his case, and in particular the President of the Division to which the case had been allocated, had lacked impartiality.
Civil compensation remedy effective for inadequate detention conditions
In the case of Zakutniy and Others v. Ukraine, the ECHR held that there had been no violation of the right to an effective remedy.
The case concerned the effectiveness of the compensatory remedy available under national law in respect of complaints concerning inadequate conditions of detention.
The Court found that, despite certain shortcomings, a civil claim for compensation brought under Articles 1173 and 1174 of the Civil Code could, in principle, be regarded as effective. Accordingly, where a complaint regarding inadequate conditions of detention was made, applicants were expected to make use of that legal avenue before lodging their complaints with the Court.
- Press release
- Press release (in Ukrainian)
Severed family ties between mother and child highlight systemic flaws in juvenile-justice and foster-care systems in Italy.
In the case of L.Z. and D.Z. v. Italy, the Court held that there had been a violation of the right to respect for family life.
The case concerned the severance of the relationship between a biological mother and her child, who had been abandoned on a pavement at birth by his father. Although the mother had taken steps to have the child returned to her, the Italian authorities had declared him abandoned and available for adoption and had then placed him in foster care in accordance with the expedited procedure. Subsequent court orders for the reunification of the mother and child had not been enforced. To date, the child has not been returned to his biological mother and decisions regarding contact arrangements have not been complied with.
The Court noted that the domestic courts had failed to take prompt, practical and appropriate measures to establish effective contact between the first applicant and the child. Then, for some five years, they had “tolerated” the lack of contact between the applicants and the non-enforcement of the decision ordering their reunification. The passage of time had in fact become the key factor in support of keeping the child in the foster family rather than returning him to his mother. That factor had given rise to a fait accompli: the severance of family ties between the first applicant and her child.
Fair trial rights in proceedings concerning fines for fishing in Slovenian waters
In the case of Makovac and Latin v. Slovenia the Court held that there had been no violation of the right to a fair trial in respect of the first applicant and that there had been a violation in respect of the second applicant.
The case concerned Croatian commercial fishing workers’ complaints about the proceedings concerning fines against them for illegally entering and fishing in Slovenian waters. They argued that there had been a breach of their defence rights in the minor offence proceedings against them, in particular that there had been no hearings in their cases.
The ECHR found that it had been legitimate for the Slovenian courts to do without an oral hearing to convict first applicant. Her conviction had been based on, among other things, photographs with two recognisable individuals which she could have challenged. Second applicant’s conviction had, however, been based on his being identified by a fisheries inspector and unspecified social media posts. An oral hearing would have been essential to put that evidence to the test.
- Press release
- Press release (in Slovenian)
Grand Chamber News
European Court accepts advisory opinion request from the Supreme Court of the Netherlands concerning review mechanism of a final acquittal for murder.
The ECHR has accepted a request for an advisory opinion submitted by the Supreme Court of the Netherlands.
The request concerns legislation which entered into force in the Netherlands in 2013 making it possible to seek review of an acquittal which had become final, to the detriment of a former defendant.
In 2025 the Board of Procurators General filed an application for review of a former defendant’s acquittal of murder, based on the results of DNA analysis obtained through techniques not available at the time of his trial. The application for review seeks to have the relevant provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure, which have been amended and have entered into force since the former defendant’s acquittal in 2012, applied retroactively.
The ECHR has decided to discontinue the advisory-opinion proceedings that it had begun in response to a request from Slovenia’s Supreme Court.
The advisory opinion had been sought in the context of judicial review (administrative‑dispute) proceedings pending before Slovenia’s Supreme Court following an appeal on points of law. At issue in the case was the question of whether allowing the issuance of a building permit and the construction of a motorway without first expropriating the affected land constituted an unjustified interference with the landowners’ property rights, as protected by Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention and Article 33 of the Constitution of Slovenia.
In June 2026, the parties reached a settlement, and the plaintiffs sought to withdraw their appeal on points of law. Normally, under Slovenian law, that would take effect automatically. However, because the proceedings had been stayed pending receipt of the advisory opinion, no procedural steps could be taken. The plaintiffs therefore asked the Supreme Court to resume the proceedings so that the withdrawal could take effect.
Hearings
Chamber hearing on Ukrainian children from Crimean childcare institutions officially unaccounted for since 2014
The Court held a Chamber hearing in the case of Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union on behalf of ten Ukrainian children v. Russia.
The case concerns ten Ukrainian children who were living in childcare institutions in Crimea in 2014 when Russia asserted jurisdiction over the peninsula. According to the association (UHHRU) acting on their behalf, Russian nationality was imposed on the children and they were put up for adoption and may have been adopted. There has been no information on their whereabouts since 2014, despite the Ukrainian authorities’ repeated requests. UHHRU allege that this effectively amounts to the children’s enforced disappearance.
Decisions
Incomplete enforcement of domestic judgments favouring applicant judges did not violate Convention.
The Court has declared inadmissible the applications in the case of Puşcaşu and Others v. Romania as being manifestly ill-founded.
The case concerned the failure to fully enforce court decisions ordering the Romanian State to pay the applicants, all judges or former judges, various sums of money as compensation for pay practices that had been found to be discriminatory in comparison with other categories of judges, prosecutors and civil servants.
- Press release
- Press release (in Romanian)
Remedy introduced for complaints about conditions of detention was effective.
The ECHR has declared inadmissible the application in the case of Manavidis v. Greece.
On 27 October 2022 Article 6A of the Prisons Code entered into force in Greece, establishing a dedicated judicial remedy in respect of detention conditions. The applicant lodged two appeals under the new remedy. The first was dismissed as unfounded in 2023, while the second was partly upheld. His case concerned the Court’s first assessment of the remedy.
The Court found that Article 6A combined both preventive and compensatory forms of redress, which operated in a complementary manner and afforded a real and practical opportunity to obtain appropriate and sufficient redress for conditions of detention incompatible with the Convention. The remedy was effective in both law and practice. The applicant had made use of that remedy which had enabled him to obtain adequate and sufficient redress. His complaint concerning the lack of an effective remedy to complain of the inadequate conditions of detention was rejected as manifestly ill-founded.
- Press release
- Press release (in Greek)
Disappearance of Estelle Mouzin: ECHR finds that French courts acknowledged deficiencies in justice system and compensated for resulting non-pecuniary damage.
The Court has declared inadmissible the application in the case of Mouzin v. France.
The case concerned the judicial investigation and proceedings in relation to the disappearance of the applicant’s 9-year-old daughter. Her body was never found. The Court’s decision was based both on the criminal conviction of Ms Olivier in 2023 and 2024 and on a 2025 judgment acknowledging the State’s gross negligence as a result of the defective operation of the public justice system.
Complaints about fairness of criminal trial brought by brothers charged with murder of Maltese journalist inadmissible
The Court has declared inadmissible the application in the case of Degiorgio v. Malta.
The case concerned the applicants’ complaints about the fairness of the criminal proceedings against them. The applicant brothers had been charged with, among other things, the wilful homicide of the journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia. After committal proceedings, but before the trial by jury took place, their lawyer renounced his mandate. As the brothers were unable to find another lawyer to represent them, the Criminal Court appointed legal aid lawyers for that purpose. The brothers agreed to a plea bargain and pleaded guilty to the charges against them. They complained before the ECHR that their trial had been unfair because they did not have legal assistance of their choosing, nor adequate time to prepare their defence.
The Court found that the appointment of legal aid lawyers had been reasonable in the circumstances. The interests of the expediency of the case and that of third parties, constituted relevant and sufficient grounds in the interests of justice for overriding the brothers’ wishes to continue looking for a lawyer of choice. The Court also found that the brothers’ guilty pleas had been entered into voluntarily and could not be said to have resulted from any duress.
The ECHR has declared the application in the case of Mouelhi v. Belgium inadmissible.
The case concerned an applicant for international protection who complained that he had not been provided with accommodation or material assistance in Belgium, as required by law, despite the final judgment of the Brussels French-Language Employment Tribunal.
The Court found that the applicant’s conduct amounted to abuse of the right of individual application. It noted that the applicant had deliberately attempted to mislead it by submitting false information in support of his request for an interim measure, in which he had stated that he was reduced to living on the streets in Belgium, when it could be seen from the documents submitted later by the respondent Government that he had been accommodated as an applicant for international protection in the Netherlands for nearly five months. Moreover, he had not corrected this information in the application form submitted after requesting the interim measure nor when he had updated his file at the Court’s request. On the contrary, he had expressly reiterated that he was still having to sleep on the streets.
The Court has declared the application in the case of Vendrame and Others v. Italy inadmissible.
The application concerned the imposition of land-use restrictions on private plots of land belonging to two of the applicants due to the incorporation of the land into a newly instituted nature reserve. The land was being used by the other applicant, an agricultural company, for poplar harvesting. In October 2011, a request by the company for authorisation from the municipality of Codroipo to replant a poplar grove on the land was refused for incompatibility with the land-use restrictions.
The applicants lodged proceedings challenging the incorporation of the land in the nature reserve, arguing, amongst other things, that that they had not been provided with compensation for such restrictions. The domestic courts dismissed their action, noting that the restrictions did not give rise to a right to compensation, as they had not been imposed with a view to expropriating the land. However, other allowances were available instead.
Paying particular regard to the State’s leeway in the context of environmental protection policies, the Court considered that a fair balance had been struck between the general interest and the applicants’ right to decide how to use their land.
The ECHR has declared inadmissible the application in the case of Macovei v. Romania.
The case concerned proceedings brought by the applicant, a politician, to challenge sanctions imposed on her for having violated the rules on election financing during her 2014 presidential campaign.
The Court held that the applicant’s actions and the sanctions imposed on her related to electoral misconduct. The actions were not classified as “criminal” under Romanian law since the domestic authorities did not consider them to be criminal offences, but only minor offences. Also, they were not criminal in nature.
- Press release
- Press release (in Romanian)
Other News
On 23 October 2026, the Vice-President of the Court, Arnfinn Bårdsen, attended the XIII International Annual Scientific and Practical Conference on Constitutional Law, dedicated to the Day of Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania, organised by the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania and Mykolas Romeris University at the Lithuanian Parliament in Vilnius.
On that occasion, Vice-President Bårdsen delivered a speech titled Living Constitutions. The Vice-President emphasized that democracy, the rule of law and the effective protection of fundamental rights and freedoms are crucial for fostering a sustainable constitutional culture and for maintaining peace and stability. Drawing on historic and comparative perspectives, he argued that a resilient constitution is one that adapts and reacts, without compromising its roots, its values, its object and purpose. Moreover, Vice-President Bårdsen underlined that domestic and international courts have pivotal and complementary roles to play in defending and strengthening the European liberal democratic edifice. One crucial part of this role is to support, within the limits of their judicial functions, the continued relevance and effectiveness of constitutions, by keeping them alive, and thereby resistant against erosion and attacks.
Gediminas Sagatys, the judge elected in respect of Lithuania, also attended the conference and gave a lecture on the recent case-law of the Court in cases against Lithuania.
On 21 October 2026, the President of the Court, Mattias Guyomar, welcomed a delegation from the Constitutional Court of Ecuador, led by its President, Jhoel Escudero Soliz. The visit provided an opportunity for the participants to gain deeper insight into the work of the Court and its case-law, thereby strengthening judicial dialogue beyond Europe's borders.