April 19, 2024
By Noa Vreven On 14 December 2023, the European Court of Human Rights ruled in the case of M.L. v. Poland (no. 40119/21). The case concerned the prohibition of abortion on the legal grounds of foetal abnormality, following a much-discussed ruling by the Polish Constitutional Court of 2020. This legal development forced the applicant to […]
February 27, 2024
By Dr Dimitrios Kagiaros In O.G. and others v. Greece, the Third Section of the ECtHR delivered a compelling judgment vindicating the rights of sex workers living with HIV in Greece who had been subjected to unprecedented public shaming and vilification by Greek authorities. While the judgment unequivocally denounced the actions of the Greek authorities, […]
May 04, 2022
An interview with Corina Heri, author of ‘Responsive Human Rights. Vulnerability, Ill-treatment and the ECtHR‘ (Hart, 2021). Questions by Jens T. Theilen. Jens Theilen: Let’s start out with the concepts at the heart of your book. One crucial notion is that of vulnerability, of course. Another is the notion of responsiveness – it features less […]
May 03, 2022
By Eva Brems Strasbourg Observers is happy to host a blog symposium that presents three recent monographs featuring in-depth research on the case law of the European Court of Human Rights. All three were written by young scholars. Corina Heri is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Zürich; Jens Theilen is a research associate […]
March 09, 2022
By Maïté De Rue The Open Society European Policy Institute (OSEPI, a branch of the Open Society Foundations network) submitted on 24 January 2022 a collective complaint against Bulgaria to the European Committee of Social Rights (ECSR), the body of the Council of Europe that monitors States’ compliance with the European Social Charter. OSEPI claims […]
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 […]
July 30, 2019
By Corina Heri, postdoctoral researcher at the University of Amsterdam ‘When he kills you, come and see us’, police reportedly told the applicant in Volodina v. Russia before proceeding to ignore her allegations of domestic violence. On 9 July, the Third Section found that the respondent State had violated its positive obligations under Article 3 […]
April 12, 2019
By Corina Heri, postdoctoral researcher at the University of Amsterdam Three years ago, on this blog, Lourdes Peroni wrote about the failings of the domestic response to the alleged rape of an 11-year-old girl in M.G.C. v. Romania. Today, the ECtHR is continuing to apply ‘coercive obligations’ regarding rape and sexual violence, as crystallized by […]
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 […]
March 08, 2019
By Fulvia Staiano, Adjunct Professor of International Law and European Union Law (Giustino Fortunato University) On 15 January 2019, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) delivered an inadmissibility decision on the case of Emabet Yeshtla v. the Netherlands. In this case, the ECtHR was asked to determine whether the withdrawal of the applicant’s housing […]
February 20, 2015
This guest post was written by Salvo Nicolosi, Postdoctoral Researcher at Ghent University’s Human Rights Centre. The recent decision in A.M.E. v. The Netherlands, issued by the European Court of Human Rights last 13 January 2015 and notified in writing on 5 February 2015, offers another occasion to assess through a human rights perspective the […]
December 01, 2014
This guest post was written by Nesa Zimmermann, Ph.D. candidate and teaching assistant at the University of Geneva, Switzerland (*) The Court’s recent ruling in Tarakhel v. Switzerland became famous almost before it was delivered. The case has received strong media attention, and some claimed the judgment signified “the end of the Dublin system”. However, […]
July 03, 2014
By Saïla Ouald Chaib and Lourdes Peroni This week, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights published its long-expected judgment in S.A.S. v. France. The case concerns a ban on the wearing of face veils in the public space. Although the outcome of such highly debated cases is always unpredictable, we hoped […]
February 26, 2014
T.M. and C.M. v. Moldova is one of the latest instances of domestic authorities’ passivity in protecting women against domestic violence. At the root of this passivity was a failure to understand the seriousness and extent of the problem and its discriminatory effect on women. This was reflected in misconceptions about both the nature of […]
January 15, 2014
As we announced earlier, Lourdes Peroni and I have written an article together which analyzes the development of the vulnerable group concept in the Strasbourg case law. I am happy to say that this article has now been published as: Lourdes Peroni & Alexandra Timmer, Vulnerable Groups: the Promise of an Emergent Concept in European […]
November 29, 2013
On Wednesday, our research team attended the Grand Chamber hearing at the European Court of Human Rights in the case of S.A.S. v. France, in which we submitted a third party intervention on behalf of the Ghent University Human Rights Centre. The case concerns the French law banning the face veil, a highly debated piece […]
October 21, 2013
The Strasbourg Court has recently delivered its first judgment on the topic of HIV-based employment discrimination. I.B. v. Greece (judgment in French!) concerns a man who is HIV-positive and who was fired from his job, because his employer wished to keep the company running smoothly. What happened was that a group of I.B.’s co-workers, finding […]
March 18, 2013
This post was written by Alexandra Timmer and Lourdes Peroni Alexandra and I are happy to announce the forthcoming publication of our joint Article “Vulnerable Groups: The Promise of an Emerging Concept in European Human Rights Convention Law.” The piece will be published in the International Journal of Constitutional Law – I•CON. In this Article, […]
February 19, 2013
This guest post was written by Elaine Webster. Elaine holds a PhD from the University of Edinburgh and is currently a lecturer and director of the Centre for the Study of Human Rights Law at the University of Strathclyde. In S.H.H. v. United Kingdom a chamber of the ECtHR, by four votes to three, found […]
February 06, 2013
The Strasbourg Court has once more delivered a judgment in a Roma school segregation case. The applicants in Horváth and Kiss v. Hungary are two young Roma men, who were diagnosed as having mild mental disabilities when they were children. As a result of these diagnoses, they were placed in a remedial school. Their education […]