On 20 March 2026, the Court hosted the legal symposium Racial Discrimination in European and International Law: Challenges of Coordination between Strasbourg, Luxembourg and Geneva, co organised by the Court, the University of Strasbourg and Utrecht University. The symposium brought together representatives from the Court, the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, the Court of Justice of the European Union, the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance, as well as academics.

In his opening remarks, the President of the Court, Mattias Guyomar, looked back at the origins of the European Convention on Human Rights and its clear link to the fight against discrimination. He then elaborated on how Article 14 and Protocol No. 12 operate in practice to tackle racial discrimination through the living instrument doctrine, before turning to the theme of dialogue as a means of promoting a deeper understanding of the respective roles in the protection of human rights and the cross fertilisation of standards, from universal to regional.

Ivana Jelić, Vice President of the Court and judge elected in respect of Montenegro, chaired a panel discussion on access to justice and the (in)visibility of groups subject to racial discrimination. Section President and judge elected in respect of Greece, Ioannis Ktistakis, noted that the Court has developed a set of judicial techniques capable of exposing the point at which apparent neutrality conceals hierarchy, exclusion or prejudice. He added that the Court’s contribution lies in the careful articulation of standards of scrutiny, standards of proof, standards of investigation and standards of justification — a deliberate juridical response to the realities of substantive inequality.