Strasbourg, 02/02/2015 (Agence Europe) - It was with clear satisfaction that European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) President Dean Spielmann of Luxembourg took stock of the year 2014. The Court is clearing up the worrying backlog that led to procedural reform, Spielmann announced on Thursday 29 January, with figures to hand to back up his claim.
Between December 2013 and December 2014, the number of outstanding cases dropped from 100,000 to 69,900, a fall of 30%. This reduction is due to the so-called “single judge” procedure along with the creation of a unit responsible for filtering out inadmissible cases. The backlog of cases numbered 151,600 in 2011.
Of the 69,900 cases still before the ECHR, 13,650, 19.5% of cases, relate to Ukraine, 10,100, 14.4%, are against Italy and largely relate to excessively long proceedings. Russia, long the number one in the leading three, has fallen to third in the list of the 47 Council of Europe states, with 10,000 motions pending (14.3%). Turkey comes fifth, with 9,500 cases pending (13.6%).
In general terms, half of the priority cases among the 69,900 are in relation to Russia (35%) and Romania (13%), with Turkey subject to 11% of cases of this type.
In terms of the rulings delivered by the ECHR in 2014, the annual report of infringements by country shows that the states against which the largest numbers of rulings finding at least one violation of the European Convention on Human Rights were handed down were Russia (122 rulings), Turkey (94), Romania (74), Greece (50) and Hungary (50).
President Spielmann stressed the need for each member country to ensure that, as far as possible, endemic problems are resolved at national level before being brought before the Court where they are so-called “repetitive cases”. The conference that will take place in Brussels as part of the Belgian presidency of the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers will focus on this responsibility that is incumbent upon the states, he said.
When asked about the murderous attack on the offices of Charlie Hebdo on 7 January, Spielmann stated that, in this area, Court case-law has hitherto been established case by case, “each time, with a delicate balance between freedom of expression, freedom of conscience and religion and respect for individual identity as defined by Article 8 of the Convention”.
As for Russia's threat of leaving the Council of Europe, after the Parliamentary Assembly imposed sanctions on it, Spielmann could not conceive of this ever coming to pass. “We're not there yet”, he said before acknowledging that, if such a thing were to happen, Russia would no longer be party to the European Convention on Human Rights, and that would be “a real political disaster” (our translation throughout). (VL)