Strasbourg Observers

View posts from: International law

  • Ash Stanley-Ryan

J.C. and Others v. Belgium: the delicate balance of state immunity and human dignity

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, […]

  • Guest Blogger

Correia de Matos v. Portugal: Fragmented protection of the right to defend oneself in person

May 24, 2018

Dr. Dorothea Staes (affiliated researcher, The Perelman Center for Legal Philosophy, ULB, Belgium and trainee at the European Commission) In the Grand Chamber judgement Correia de Matos v. Portugal of 4 April 2018, the European Court of Human Rights (hereinafter: the Court) decided by a majority of nine votes to eight that the right to […]

  • Guest Blogger

Al-Dulimi and Montana Management Inc. v. Switzerland: Norm conflict between UNSC Resolution and ECHR?

September 05, 2016

Guest post by Cedric De Koker, Phd Researcher, IRCP, Ghent University. On 21 June 2016, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) rendered its judgment in the case of Al-Dulimi and Montana Management Inc. v. Switzerland (no. 5809/08). At issue was a potential norm conflict between the obligations stemming from a […]

  • Guest Blogger

A Different Perspective on Hassan v. United Kingdom: A Reply to Frederic Bernard

October 14, 2014

This guest post was written by Cedric De Koker, Phd Researcher, Institute for International Research on Criminal Policy (IRCP), Ghent University. On the 16th September 2014, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) rendered its judgment in the landmark case of Hassan v. United Kingdom. The case concerned the deprivation of […]

  • Guest Blogger

Deprivation of liberty in armed conflicts: the Strasbourg Court’s attempt at reconciling human rights law and international humanitarian law in Hassan v. UK

October 02, 2014

This guest blog post was written by Frederic Bernard, Lecturer at the University of Geneva, Global Studies Institute, and Attorney-at-law admitted to the Geneva Bar. The fragmentation of international law has been for some time the subject of in-depth academic and expert studies, as exemplified, for instance, by the report dedicated to this topic on […]