January 12, 2022
By Ash Stanley-Ryan International law walks a tightrope between the rights of sovereign States and the rights of those who comprise them. Tip too far to either side and the system breaks – sovereignty either becomes unbridled power, or becomes meaningless. This delicate balancing is most evident when sovereign power and human rights directly collide, […]
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 […]
December 22, 2021
By Dr. Cathérine Van de Graaf and Yannick Schoog Introduction On the 26th of October 2021, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR; the Court) answered the question of whether or not a fixed age limit to qualify for a housing subsidy for ‘young families’ was discriminatory in the negative. The case of Šaltinytė v. […]
December 17, 2021
Introduction Bartolo Parnis and Others v. Malta (Bartolo Parnis) is the last in a series of judgments in which Maltese landlords have been contesting before the ECtHR the remedy afforded to them by the domestic Constitutional Court, after concluding that strict rent controls were in breach of their property rights. The finding of such a […]
December 14, 2021
By Naoual El Yattouti In the case Polat v. Austria, the mother of a deceased child complained that the carrying out of a post-mortem despite her and her husband’s objections based on religious reasons, violated her rights under Articles 8, 9 and 13 of the European Convention on Human Rights (hereafter: the Convention). The European […]
December 03, 2021
by Jenny Sandvig, Hannah Cecilie Brænden and Peter Dawson In one of the first climate cases to be decided by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), the European Network of National Human Rights Institutions (ENNHRI) has submitted a joint third-party intervention. The intervention, a first by national human rights institutions (NHRIs) in an international […]
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 23, 2021
By Dr Roxanna Dehaghani Who satisfies the definition of a ‘vulnerable accused’ and does a failure to provide reasonable adjustments undermine Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights? These questions were central to the judgment in Hasáliková v Slovakia. This comment focuses on A’s claim regarding vulnerability and the absence of adjustments, in […]
November 18, 2021
By John Trajer With Zoletic and Others v. Azerbaijan, delivered on 7 October 2021, the European Court of Human Rights (‘the ECtHR’ or ‘the Court’) has signalled once again a growing eagerness to intervene on issues related to slavery, servitude, forced labour, and human trafficking under Article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights […]
November 12, 2021
By Dr. Ingrida Milkaite and dr. Pieter Cannoot 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 on the parental rights of a transgender person, in which the Human Rights Centre submitted a third party intervention (earlier blogpost summarising our […]
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 […]
November 05, 2021
By Ayşe Bingöl Demir On 5 May 2021, the European Court of Human Rights (‘the Court’) handed down yet another judgment against Turkey finding a violation of Article 10 – freedom of expression – of the European Convention on Human Rights (‘the Convention’). Akdeniz and others v. Turkey concerned a general ban on the dissemination […]
November 02, 2021
By Joseph Finnerty The Chamber’s Carter v. Russia judgment indicates a revolution for the Court’s approach to the extraterritorial application of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR). Its publication suggests a turn away from its, to put it diplomatically, conservative case law on the subject. Its innovation also extends to its approach to attribution […]
October 29, 2021
By Tobias Mortier A little political tension in an electoral context is not uncommon. However, the Armenian presidential elections in 2008 were nothing short of riotous. The Court has already dealt with numerous cases in which the events surrounding these elections were contested. For instance, in the case of Mushegh Saghatelyan v. Armenia, the Court […]
October 22, 2021
By Nele Schuldt The case of Klimaseniorinnen v. Switzerland has attracted much attention since it was lodged before the European Court of Human Rights (European Court, Strasbourg Court) in late November 2020. The applicants, an organization of elderly women, alongside four individual elderly women, alleged that the Swiss government had, firstly, on account of inadequate […]
October 19, 2021
By Natasa Mavronicola ‘We are today perilously close to tipping points that, once passed, will send global temperatures spiralling catastrophically higher. If we continue on our current path, we will face the collapse of everything that gives us our security: food production, access to fresh water, habitable ambient temperature and ocean food chains. And if […]
October 12, 2021
Ignatius Yordan Nugraha ‘September 11th Two Thousand-Fun!’ This phrase was uttered by Peter Griffin in a Family Guy episode, Back to the Woods, while pretending to be James Woods to smear his name, in a clear reference to the 9/11 attacks against the United States of America in 2001. This sort of joke may be […]
October 08, 2021
By Dr Cornelia Klocker Does the finding of an ineffective investigation and a violation of the duty to cooperate compensate for a non-engagement with the substantive limb of Article 2 ECHR? Natalia Estemirova was one of the most prominent human rights defenders in Chechnya, investigating and documenting cases of enforced disappearances, abductions, torture and extrajudicial […]
October 05, 2021
By Claire Poppelwell-Scevak When the Court rendered its judgment on Fedotova and Others v. Russia, I received numerous e-mails from colleagues who appeared to be split over the importance of this case. Camp One thought it was a repeat of Oliari but with Russia as the Respondent State instead of Italy, and Camp Two felt […]
October 01, 2021
By Alicia Hendricks The case of Gruba and Others v. Russia concerns the difference in entitlement to parental leave between policemen and policewomen. The European Court of Human Rights (the Court) ruled in favour of the male defendants by stating that this difference in treatment amounted to sex discrimination contrary to Article 14 (prohibition of […]