Strasbourg Observers

View posts from: Migration

  • Felix Peerboom

A.D. v Malta: The Continuous Application of a Defective Asylum System

January 12, 2024

by Felix Peerboom On 17 October 2023, the European Court for Human Rights (ECtHR, the Court) published its ruling in A.D. v. Malta (press release available in English and French). The Court’s condemnation of Malta in this case for its ill-treatment of the applicant — a vulnerable asylum-seeker and presumed minor suffering from tuberculosis (TB), […]

  • Lorenzo Bernardini

H.M. and Others v. Hungary: Immigration Detention, Burden of Proof and Principle of Necessity: Weakening Safeguards at the Borders?

August 19, 2022

By Lorenzo Bernardini Introduction How high is the burden of proof on the foreigner who claims to have suffered degrading treatments? In which cases may the authorities adopt coercive methods against a foreigner already detained? The European Court of Human Rights (‘the Court’, ‘the ECtHR’ or ‘the Strasbourg Court’) was called upon to answer these […]

  • Strasbourg Observers

Proving minority: the Human Rights Centre and CESSMIR submit a third party intervention regarding age assessment of unaccompanied minors

May 23, 2022

By Mathilde Brackx and Laura Cools The Human Rights Centre of Ghent University (Belgium) and the Centre for the Social Study of Migration and Refugees (CESSMIR) recently submitted a third-party intervention (TPI) before the European Court of Human Rights in the communicated case of Fatoumata Diaraye BARRY v. Belgium. The case concerns a decision of […]

  • Guest Blogger

Unuane v United Kingdom: does the Convention require “pure” proportionality?

December 23, 2020

By Lewis Graham (PhD Researcher at Pembroke College, Cambridge) The Fourth Section recently delivered its judgment in Unuane v United Kingdom, in which it found that the UK had breached Article 8 ECHR through approving the deportation of an individual without properly evaluating the impact this would have on his private and family life under […]

  • Guest Blogger

The case of Muhammad and Muhammad v. Romania: the first Grand Chamber judgment on article 1 of Protocol Nr. 7 ECHR (procedural safeguards with regard to expulsion of aliens)

October 29, 2020

By Bahija Aarrass (Assistant professor of administrative and migration law at the Open University Netherlands) In the judgment in the case of Muhammad and Muhammad v. Romania, the Grand Chamber  of the European Court of Human Rights held that there had been a violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 7 of the ECHR, which […]

  • Strasbourg Observers

A right to regularize unlawful residence? Pormes v. Netherlands untangled

September 18, 2020

By Mark Klaassen (assistant professor of immigration law at the Europa Institute of Leiden University) To what extent can irregular migrants rely on the protection of Article 8 ECHR to regularize their irregular residence? The European Court of Human Rights (the Court) has dealt with this issue before, in different cases with various factual backgrounds. […]

  • Guest Blogger

‘Tell me your story, but hurry up because I have to expel you’ – Asady and Others v. Slovakia: how to (quickly) conduct individual interviews and (not) apply the ND & NT “own culpable conduct” test to collective expulsions

May 06, 2020

By Francesco Luigi Gatta, Research Fellow, UCLouvain, member of EDEM (Equipe droits européens et migrations) On 24 March 2020, the ECtHR delivered its judgment in Asady and Others v. Slovakia, which concerned the expulsion to Ukraine of a group of Afghan nationals. With a controversial ruling (passed by a slight majority of 4 votes to […]

  • Guest Blogger

Blog Symposium “Strasbourg Observers turn ten” (5): Daring to think – the spirit of human rights

April 23, 2020

By Marie-Bénédicte Dembour Have the Strasbourg Observers really been running only for ten years? On receiving the invitation to celebrate this anniversary, my mind travelled back to the time before your emergence, and I felt rather isolated in my critical approach to the study of the European Court of Human Rights. Long before I joined […]

  • Guest Blogger

The Grand Chamber Judgment in Ilias and Ahmed v Hungary: Immigration Detention and how the Ground beneath our Feet Continues to Erode

December 23, 2019

By Dr. Vladislava Stoyanova (Associate Professor, Faculty of Law, Lund University) The ECtHR has been for a long time criticized for its approach to immigration detention that diverts from the generally applicable principles to deprivation of liberty in other contexts. As Cathryn Costello has observed in her article Immigration Detention: The Ground beneath our Feet, […]

  • Guest Blogger

A new chapter on the deportation of ill persons and Article 3 ECHR: the European Court of Human Rights judgment in Savran v. Denmark

October 17, 2019

By Dr. Mark Klaassen, Institute of Immigration Law, Leiden University On 1 October 2019, in the Savran judgment the European Court of Human Rights (hereinafter: ‘the Court’) has applied the Paposhvili-test in cases involving the expulsion of migrants who fear to be the victim of a violation of Article 3 ECHR because a medical treatment […]

  • Guest Blogger

H.A. and others v. Greece – restrictive acknowledgement of irregular migrant vulnerability

March 29, 2019

By Elina Todorov, PhD Candidate, Tampere University (Finland) On 28. February 2019 the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) delivered a judgement concerning unaccompanied minors in an irregular situation, namely H.A. and others v. Greece.  In H.A. the Court found several violations of the Convention, in particular a partial violation of Article 3 regarding the […]

  • Dr. Mark Klaassen

The best interests of the child in deportation cases: An analysis of T.C.E. v. Germany

March 30, 2018

By Dr. Mark Klaassen, Assistant professor at the Institute of Immigration Law (Leiden University) Introduction On 1 March 2018, the Fifth Section of the Court unanimously held in T.C.E. v. Germany that the revocation of the right of residence in Germany of a Nigerian national after being criminally convicted for a drugs related offence did […]

  • Guest Blogger

‘Of course a stranger must conform’: reading the Ndidi judgment with Euripides’ Medea

November 27, 2017

By Benoit Dhondt, Belgian lawyer specialized in migration and refugee law. As a teaching assistant, he is also connected to the Human Rights Centre of Ghent University, more specifically its Human Rights and Migration Law Clinic. Recently the ECtHR took an umpteenth swing at the question to what extent the family life and private life […]

  • Strasbourg Observers

One-way ticket to Sudan: standard-setting, yet disconnection between reasoning and outcome in N.A. v. Switzerland?

June 26, 2017

By Ellen Desmet, assistant professor of migration law at Ghent University On 30 May 2017, the European Court of Human Rights decided two cases regarding the expulsion of rejected asylum seekers by Switzerland to Sudan. In A.I. v. Switzerland, the Court held unanimously that there would be a violation of Articles 2 and 3 ECHR […]

  • Guest Blogger

The Grand Chamber’s ruling in Khlaifia and Others v Italy: one step forward, one step back?

January 10, 2017

Guest post by Denise Venturi, PhD Student in International Law, Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna (Italy) and KU Leuven (Belgium) On 15 December 2016 the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) gave its much awaited ruling in the case Khlaifia and Others v Italy. The judgement follows a 2015 decision of the Second […]

  • Lourdes Peroni

Paposhvili v. Belgium: Memorable Grand Chamber Judgment Reshapes Article 3 Case Law on Expulsion of Seriously Ill Persons

December 15, 2016

In what is possibly one of the most important judgments of 2016, Paposhvili v. Belgium, the Grand Chamber has memorably reshaped its Article 3 case law on the expulsion of seriously ill migrants. In a unanimous judgment, the Court leaves behind the restrictive application of the high Article 3 threshold set in N. v. the […]

  • Guest Blogger

On a positive note: B.A.C. v. Greece

November 21, 2016

By Ellen Desmet, assistant professor of migration law at Ghent University. On 13 October 2016, the European Court of Human Rights unanimously found in B.A.C. v. Greece that the Greek state’s omission to decide on an asylum application during more than twelve years violated Article 8 as well as Article 13 in conjunction with Article […]

  • Guest Blogger

Khan v. Germany, Episode II: The Empire strikes out

October 31, 2016

Guest post by Benoit Dhondt, Belgian lawyer specialized in migration and refugee law. As a teaching assistant, he is also connected to the Human Rights Centre of Ghent University, more specifically its Human Rights and Migration Law Clinic. Several practitioners were disappointed with the road the ECtHR traveled in Khan v. Germany last year. With […]

  • Guest Blogger

Taddeucci and McCall v. Italy: welcome novelty in the ECtHR’s case-law on equal treatment of same-sex couples

July 27, 2016

This guest post was written by Dr. Nelleke Koffeman (*) The Taddeucci and McCall v. Italy judgment of 30 June 2016 is a novelty in the ECtHR’s case-law on equal treatment of same-sex couples. It is the first time that the Court, in finding a violation of the prohibition of discrimination on grounds of sexual […]

  • Guest Blogger

Biao v. Denmark: Grand Chamber ruling on ethnic discrimination might leave couples seeking family reunification worse off

June 13, 2016

This guest post was written by Alix Schlüter, Ph.D. researcher at Bucerius Law School, Hamburg. On May 24th 2016 the Grand Chamber found that the refusal to grant family reunion to a Ghanaian couple in Denmark violated Article 14 ECHR in conjunction with Article 8 ECHR. Overruling the Chamber’s judgment of 2014, the Court held […]

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