April 11, 2022
By Elvira Loibl Introduction The case concerned the decision by the Norwegian authorities to allow the adoption of a child by a ‘Norwegian Christian’ foster family against the wishes of his mother, a Muslim Somali refugee. The judgment seems to reflect the new Zeitgeist regarding adoptions, which came to be viewed more critically within the […]
April 07, 2022
By Pieter Cannoot On 17 February 2022, the European Court of Human Rights delivered its judgment in the case of Y. v. Poland. The Court unanimously found no violation of Article 8 of the Convention (ECHR), and no violation of Article 14 taken together with Article 8. The case concerned a trans man who had […]
March 02, 2022
By Diana Dimitrova Introduction In the past years, the European Court of Human Rights (the Court) has been asked numerous times to examine different aspects of the Council of Europe’s Member States’ (secret) surveillance regimes, ranging from (mass) secret surveillance against their own residents to bulk surveillance or interception of electronic communications coming from abroad. […]
February 04, 2022
Avci v Denmark concerns an expulsion order and a permanent re-entry ban issued by the Danish High Court against Mr Avci, a settled migrant born and raised in Denmark. This judgment provides a clear illustration of the burgeoning trend towards process-based, procedural review by the European Court of Human Rights (hereinafter ‘the Court’) – a […]
February 01, 2022
By Ellen Vandennieuwenhuysen On the 7th of December 2021, the Grand Chamber issued its long awaited judgement in the Savran-case, concerning the expulsion of a Turkish national with paranoid schizophrenia from Denmark. Contrary to the Chamber, the Grand Chamber found no violation of Article 3 ECHR, as the health risks did not reach the high […]
December 28, 2021
By Sjoerd Lopik Today marks the second anniversary of the Urgenda climate ruling of the Supreme Court (Hoge Raad) of the Netherlands (a translation of the ruling can be accessed here). With its ruling, the Supreme Court finalised the first case in which a national court issued a specific order to a government to reduce […]
November 30, 2021
By Dr Kyriaki Patsianta In the case of X v. Poland, the ECtHR found that there had been a violation of articles 14 and 8 of the Convention in respect of a homosexual mother, who alleged that the removal of her youngest child from her custody, after her former husband obtained a change in the […]
November 26, 2021
Sarah de Heer Admittedly, the right to erasure, or more colloquially, the right to be forgotten is nothing new in the European legal landscape. Indeed, this right can be found as far back as 1981 in the predecessor of the Modernised Convention for the Protection of Individuals with regard to Automatic Processing of Personal Data […]
November 09, 2021
By dr. Pieter Cannoot and dr. Ingrida Milkaite On 6 July 2021 the European Court of Human Rights rendered its highly anticipated judgment in the case of A.M. and Others v. Russia, in which the Human Rights Centre submitted a third party intervention (earlier blogpost summarising our main arguments can be accessed here). The Court […]
September 21, 2021
By Helga Molbæk-Steensig What determines whether a state is a good faith interpreter? Can a state claim a generally accepted policy goal as a legitimate aim for human rights interferences if it no longer pursues that policy goal itself? What, if any, role do letters and reports from international human rights bodies play if they […]
September 08, 2021
By Elena Patrizi, PhD Candidate at the Faculty of Law and affiliated with the Centre for Children’s Rights Studies, University of Geneva, Switzerland On 22 June 2021, the Third Section of the European Court of Human Rights (hereinafter: ECtHR) released its judgment on the case of R.B. v. Estonia, a case concerning the effectiveness […]
September 06, 2021
By Margarita S. Ilieva, a strategic equality/human rights litigator with extensive experience in negative stereotyping. The violent misogyny case of J.L. c. Italie (27.05.2021) is one of few in which the Court expressly addressed revictimisation (neglectful/actively injurious treatment of a survivor by those expected to address the original harm). Prior cases whereby this concept was […]
June 30, 2021
By Dr Marianna Iliadou, Teaching Fellow in Medical Law and Ethics at Durham University, UK. On 18 May 2021, the Third Section of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR or the Court) delivered a judgment on the contested issue of non-recognition of the parent-child relationship for a child born through cross-border surrogacy. Surrogacy is […]
June 28, 2021
By Dr Eliza Watt, researcher in cyber law, lecturer in law, Middlesex University, London, UK. On 25 May 2021 the Grand Chamber (GC) of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR, the Court) handed down its much-anticipated decision in Big Brother Watch and Others v the UK (Big Brother Watch). The case is of vital […]
June 02, 2021
By Katarzyna Ważyńska-Finck, PhD researcher at the European University Institute anda former assistant lawyer at the European Court of Human Rights. Compared to our ancestors, we are lucky to have at our disposal safe and effective vaccines against illnesses such as polio, measles or hepatitis B. To ensure that the number of immunized people is […]
March 01, 2021
By Liesa Keunen, PhD researcher at Ghent and Antwerp University, Belgium. Liesa Keunen is working on the research project ‘Tax audits on big data: exploring the legitimacy and limits in light of the prohibition of fishing expeditions’ (Ghent & Antwerp University, FWO). She is also a member of the research group Law & Technology, the […]