The quest for an effective remedy has downgraded the rights to property and home of the Greek Cypriot IDPs and upgraded the de facto authority of the illegal regime in the north of Cyprus (‘TRNC’): K.V. Mediterranean Tours Limited v. Türkiye, the Court’s latest judgment 

By Dr Costas Paraskeva and Eleni Meleagrou

Introduction

On June 10, 2025, the European Court of Human Rights (‘The Court’) delivered its judgment in the case of K.V. Mediterranean Tours Limited v. Türkiye . This is the fourth time that the Court has reviewed the domestic remedy set up by Türkiye, within its subordinate administration of the ‘Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus’ (‘TRNC’), in response to the findings of violations to the rights of property and home of 200,000 Greek Cypriot internally displaced persons (‘IDPs’), dating from 1974 and the Turkish occupation of the northern part of  Cyprus (see, for example, Loizidou v. Turkey, Cyprus v. Turkey). In the Demopoulos and Others v. Turkey inadmissibility decision, the Immovable Property Commission (‘IPC’) was ruled by the Court to be an effective remedy, providing, under the relevant law, three different remedies, restitution, compensation and exchange.

In two further inadmissibility decisions (Meleagrou and Others v. Turkey, Loizou v. Turkey) following Demopoulos, the Court held that property rights in northern Cyprus are determined by the IPC law as interpreted by the ‘TRNC’ courts, regardless of legal ownership status under the laws of the Republic of Cyprus (‘RoC’) and applicants’ property titles as issued by the Land Registry of the RoC: before the IPC, applicants are claimants who must prove ownership in accordance with the restrictive provisions of the IPC law. In Joannou v. Turkey, the Court found a violation of the right to property because of the ‘protracted length of proceedings’. Nonetheless, the Court insisted, this finding does not render the remedy ineffective. In K.V. Mediterranean, the Court reiterated its findings in Joannou whilst accepting the legitimacy of an ancient property claim by a Muslim religious foundation emphasising once again the compliance of the ‘TRNC’ legal framework with the Convention. The remedy for violations of the rights to property and home of the Cypriot IDPs remains unassailable.

Case Facts

The applicant is a Greek Cypriot company that owns property in the fenced area of Famagusta (Turkish military zone) within the ‘TRNC’, which has been inaccessible since the 1974 Turkish military occupation. The company applied to the IPC in July 2010, claiming compensation for the loss of use of its property, restitution of the immovable property, compensation for non-pecuniary damage, statutory interest and legal costs. The proceedings before the IPC were repeatedly adjourned for several years at the request of the ‘TRNC’ Attorney General. The case was finally heard by the ‘TRNC’ High Administrative Court (‘HAC’) in November 2016 which addressed the dispute between the parties regarding ownership and delays. The HAC ruled that EVKAF, a Muslim religious foundation, was the current registered owner of the property in question and therefore could be a party to the proceedings, dismissing the applicant company’s complaint about adjournments and delays in the proceedings. The ‘TRNC’ authorities filed their response with the IPC in 2019, but the applicant company refused to participate further in the proceedings stating that it would await the Court’s ruling before reaching any settlement.

The parties’ arguments and the Court’s judgment

The applicant company complained that proceedings before the IPC were protracted, ineffective and unfair, claiming violations of its rights under Articles 6, 13 and Article 1 Protocol No. 1. It also argued that the remedy of restitution was not available as the IPC had admitted the EVKAF as a party to the proceedings, following the decision of ‘TRNC’ courts that the property under consideration was registered to that religious foundation. The Government argued that the application should be dismissed for non-exhaustion of domestic remedies since the fact that the EVKAF was admitted to the proceedings did not prevent the applicant from being awarded one of the three remedies under the law of the IPC. It also claimed that there were domestic remedies within the ‘TRNC’ legal system for reviewing the complaints for excessive delays which the company failed to exhaust.

The Court observed that the central issue raised by the applicant company related to its inability to obtain restitution of and compensation for its property and, referring to its relevant jurisprudence (Shesti Mai Engineering OOD and Others v. Bulgaria, para. 64), concluded that the complaint should be examined under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 only. The Court reiterated its position in Demopoulos and Others that the IPC was an accessible and effective remedy for the violation of the right to property of the Greek Cypriot IDPs, briefly reviewed its subsequent case law in order to emphasise that a finding of violation of Article 1 Protocol No. 1 due to protracted proceedings (Joannou) does not undermine the effectiveness of the remedy which other applicants are obliged to exhaust before turning to Strasbourg.

The Court dismissed the applicant company’s claim that the proceedings were rendered ineffective because of the admission of EVKAF as a party since that precluded restitution, and agreed with the Government that restitution was only one of the three remedies the IPC offered (Meleagrou and Others), and did not have to be granted in every case, whilst compensation and exchange were also available. Considering the applicant company’s complaint about the length of proceedings, the Court found that the ‘TRNC’ authorities were responsible for the delays failing not just to provide an initial opinion within 35 days as provided under the law, but procrastinating for the best part of the decade in providing and/or asking for the necessary documents thus preventing the case from moving forward. The Court further attributed the incoherence of the proceedings to the ‘passivity’ coupled with a lack of diligence of the IPC in the face of such procrastination which contributed to the lack of progress and the excessive delays. Hence, there was a violation of Article 1 Protocol No. 1.

The Court rejected the applicant company’s remaining complaints under Article 6 and Article 13 of the Convention – most notably its claim that the participation of the EVKAF religious foundation rendered the proceedings unfair. It pointed approvingly to the provision under the IPC law for participation of third parties with claims of ownership to the property as compliant with the principles of fairness and equality of arms which provide that the interest of third parties must be taken into consideration in the overall assessment of the proper administration of justice.

Comment and analysis

The judgment, 51 years after the loss of properties and homes by the Greek Cypriots IDPs and 16 yeas after the Demopoulos inadmissibility decision, demonstrates the Court’s determination to refrain from any suggestion that Türkiye’s means of remedying the breaches does not meet its standard of a ‘practical and effective’ remedy. A critical review of the long history of the Cyprus cases at the Court (1977-present, see Paraskeva, C., & Meleagrou, E., Cyprus at the European Court of Human Rights) shows that the Court reached its current position by a subtly effected but decisive revision of the nature of the interference with the right to property: Post Demopoulos, it falls under the second rule, deprivation of property, of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 and not, as it was under the Court’s well-settled jurisprudence in the Cyprus IDP cases, the first rule, interference with the peaceful enjoyment of possessions. This change was achieved via the deus ex machina of the IPC law whereby the deprivation has retrospectively acquired a much-needed legal basis, in essence presuming expropriation of the properties of Greek Cypriot IDPs. Consequently, Türkiye, via, the ‘TRNC’, its subordinate administration, is afforded the wide margin of appreciation that states enjoy under the Court’s settled jurisprudence in this area, both in fashioning the underlying law, with its restrictive requirements regarding recognition of legal ownership, and in the administering of the remedy itself.

The Court’s determination to assist Türkiye in setting up an ‘effective’, ‘essentially compensatory’ ‘remedy’ in order to comply with Article 46 of the Convention, and thus, amongst other, rid itself of the existing large volume of repetitive applications from the Greek Cypriot IDPs (at the time of the Demopoulos decision there were 1400 individual applications form CypriotIDPs), as well as future well-founded applications, involved the harnessing of all jurisprudential tools at its disposal, and crucially so from its transitional jurisprudence stock; importing  a number of extraneous concepts such as the deleterious effect of the passage of time on the substance and content of the rights allegedly violated and the discount in legitimate expectations to effectively enjoy them, so that these rights become degraded/are corrupted to a hitherto unprecedented extent (‘titles emptied’, ‘homes from the past’ -see Demopoulos and Papayianni and Others v. Turkey).

For Greek Cypriot IDPs to be recognised as owners under the remedial mechanism of the IPC in the ‘TRNC’, they have to satisfy the restrictive legal requirements laid out by the IPC law: a title to land, within the area of the ‘TRNC’, issued by the Land Registry of the RoC, does not by itself bestow ownership; an applicant is not recognised as an owner but as a claimant to properties that have already been transferred to third parties or the ‘TRNC’ and may lack ‘legitimate expectation’ that an enforceable claim would be determined in their favour. It is important to note that unlike the restitution laws introduced by the Eastern European states, during their transition from autocracies to democratic states, the IPC law is not a law the main aim of which is the restitution of properties to the Cyprus IDP^[i] but in essence a compensatory mechanism.

In the inadmissibility decisions in Demopoulos, Meleagrou and Loizou, the Court’s deference to the judgments and decisions of the ‘TRNC’ courts follows its pronouncements in earlier judgments (see, for example, Foka v. Turkey), regarding the availability of domestic remedies within the ‘TRNC’ (purportedly for the avoidance of a human rights vacuum in the context of the Cyprus cases). This deference has effectively elevated an illegal entity under international law, to a quasi-Member State whose legal, justice and administrative system are apparently ‘compliant’ with the ECHR.

Such reasoning cannot but influence any possible negotiations between the two communities for the reunification of the island. In that respect the Court’s role, contrary to its statement in Demopoulos (see para. 115), goes well beyond its remit of dealing with individual applications as distinct from large scale abuses of human rights^[ii] and the settling of competing State sovereign rights.

Following the Court’s findings in Demopoulos, the Cypriot IDPs have since been faced with the dilemma of either waiting for an increasingly unlikely overall political settlement which recognises their rights to homes and properties in the occupied north or taking their chances by submitting to a quasi-legal process, of which arbitrariness, ineffectiveness and extreme delaying tactics (Joannou v. Turkey, finding of violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 because of the IPC’s protracted and ineffective proceedings), have been identified, as prominent characteristics. It is argued that such a remedy does not uphold the rights of IDPs in Cyprus nor can it provide a reasonable, legitimate precedent for the safeguarding of the rights of the increasingly large numbers of IDPs elsewhere within the States of the Council of Europe. Furthermore, it does not accord with the strategies proposed and recommendations adopted by the other organs of the Council of Europe in order to safeguard the rights to property and home of IDPs in conflict zones.^[iii]

Conclusion

In its quest for an effective domestic remedy for Türkiye’s massive violations of the rights to property and home of the Cyprus IDPs, the Court has shifted from an interference with the right to property to a lawful deprivation and has increasingly accorded the illegal ‘TRNC’ de facto authority in judicial, administrative and all other matters within the territory occupied by the Turkish army. This development has significant repercussions for both the rights of IDPs and the legal status of de facto entities under international law. The judgment in K.V. Mediterranean Tours Limited v. Türkiye demonstrates, at best, a failure on the part of the Court to comprehend the implications of endorsing a remedial mechanism alongside a legal and administrative framework, within a conflict zone, administered by a rogue non-Member State outside the reach of international law.

[i] See the ‘analogy’ drawn by the Court in Demopoulos, (in response to the position that the IPC law does not adequately provide for restitution) between the restitution laws introduced by the Eastern European democracies and restitution as one of the three remedies under the IPC law, Demopoulos and Others v. Turkey, para. 117: ‘It is evident from the Court’s case-law that while restitution laws implemented to mitigate the consequences of mass infringements of property rights caused, for example, by communist regimes, may have been found to pursue a legitimate aim, the Court has stated that it is still necessary to ensure that the redress applied to those old injuries does not create disproportionate new wrongs. To that end, the legislation should make it possible to take into account the particular circumstances of each case (…). Thus, there is no precedent in the Court’s case-law to support the proposition that a Contracting State must pursue a blanket policy of restoring property to owners without taking into account the current use or occupation of the property in question.’

[ii] In September 2014, Erik Fribergh, the Registrar of the ECtHR, told Government representatives on the Steering Committee for Human Rights (CDDH) that ‘the Court is (…) not equipped to deal with large scale abuses of human rights. It cannot settle war-like conflicts between States.’ Yet, as Fribergh noted, the ECtHR is increasingly being called on to adjudicate on such situations (see, for example the two Grand Chamber judgments delivered on 16 June 2015: Sargsyan v. Azerbaijan, and Chiragov and Others v. Armenia).

[iii] See, for example, CoE, Recommendation (2006)6 on internally displaced persons, 5 April 2006; PACE Resolution 1708(2010), Solving property issues of refugees and internally displaced persons, 28 January 2010; PACE Recommendation 1901(2010), Solving property issues of refugees and internally displaced persons, 28 January 2010; PACE Doc. 12106 Report, Solving property issues of refugees and internally displaced persons, 8 January 2010; PACE Recommendation 1877(2009), Europe’s forgotten people: protecting the human rights of long-term displaced persons, 24 June 2009; PACE, Doc. 11942 Report, Europe’s forgotten people: protecting the human rights of long-term displaced persons, 8 June 2009; PACE Recommendation 1631(2003), Internal displacement in Europe, 25 November 2003.