Annual Report 2010 Provisional version EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS COUR EUROPÉENNE DES DROITS DE L'HOMME All or part of this document may be freely reproduced with acknowledgment of the source “Annual Report 2010 of the European Court of Human Rights, Council of Europe” Cover: the Human Rights Building (Architects: Richard Rogers Partnership and Atelier Claude Bucher) – Photograph: Frantisek Zvardon – Graphic design: Publications Unit of the Registry of the Court © Council of Europe, January 2011 CONTENTS Page Foreword ............................................................................................................................. 5 I. History and development of the Convention system................................................. 7 II. Composition of the Court .......................................................................................... 19 III. Composition of the Sections...................................................................................... 23 IV. Speech given by Mr Jean-Paul Costa, President of the European Court of Human Rights, on the occasion of the opening of the judicial year, 29 January 2010 .......... 27 V. Speech given by Mr Jean-Marc Sauvé, Vice-President of the French Conseil d’Etat, on the occasion of the opening of the judicial year, 29 January 2010........... 37 VI. Visits.......................................................................................................................... 47 VII. Activities of the Grand Chamber and Sections ......................................................... 51 VIII. Publication of the Court’s case-law........................................................................... 57 IX. Short survey of the main judgments and decisions delivered by the Court in 2010 65 X. Selection of judgments, decisions and communicated cases..................................... 83 Judgments .................................................................................................................. 85 Decisions ................................................................................................................... 107 Communicated cases................................................................................................. 115 XI. Cases accepted for referral to the Grand Chamber and cases in which jurisdiction was relinquished by a Chamber in favour of the Grand Chamber ............................ 119 XII. Statistical information ............................................................................................... 123 Events in total (2009-2010) ....................................................................................... 125 Pending cases allocated to a judicial formation at 31 December 2010, by respondent State......................................................................................................... 126 Pending cases allocated to a judicial formation at 31 December 2010 (main respondent States)...................................................................................................... 127 Events in total, by respondent State (2010)............................................................... 128 Violations by Article and by respondent State (2010) .............................................. 130 Applications processed in 2010................................................................................. 132 Applications allocated to a judicial formation (1955-2010)...................................... 133 European Court of Human Rights – Annual Report 2010 (provisional version) Contents Events in total, by respondent State (1 November 1998-31 December 2010) .......... 134 Applications declared inadmissible or struck out (1955-2010)................................. 136 Judgments (1959-2010)............................................................................................. 137 Applications struck out by a decision or judgment following a friendly settlement or unilateral declaration (1959-2010)........................................................................ 138 Allocated applications by State and by population (2007-2010) .............................. 139 FOREWORD The year 2010, which was the sixtieth anniversary of the European Convention on Human Rights, has been an important year for the European Court of Human Rights. For several years the non-entry into force of Protocol No. 14 had blocked a process of reform that had become indispensable for the future of our Court. Strasbourg’s judicial mechanism, which had been stretched to the limit as a result of the attraction it holds for European citizens and the trust placed in it by them, was in dire need of a new lease of life that only the entry into force of that Protocol could provide. At the end of 2009 encouraging signs from Moscow raised hopes that ratification by the Russian Federation would be forthcoming. Those hopes turned out to be founded because Protocol No. 14 was ratified on 18 February 2010 and accordingly came into force on 1 June 2010. Ratification took place at the Interlaken Conference, which was held on 18 and 19 February 2010 and hosted by the Swiss authorities during their chairmanship of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe. That conference was the other major event of the year for our Court. Switzerland’s positive response to a call for the organisation of a major political conference on the Court’s future, which I had voiced during the official opening ceremony of 2009, made it possible to carve out the path necessary for the survival of the European system for the protection of human rights. There will now be a “before” and an “after” Interlaken. The idea of a conference had been mooted in a somewhat subdued climate, particularly for the reasons indicated above. However, Interlaken has kept its promises. Firstly, and this was its first objective, the conference gave the States an opportunity to reaffirm their commitment to human rights and the Court. This was demonstrated by the very high number of participants at ministerial level. Next, and above all, the efforts invested by everyone bore fruit and resulted in a political Declaration being adopted, to much acclaim, in which the States undertake to ensure the protection of human rights, and in an Action Plan which constitutes the basis of future reforms. The Declaration and Action Plan are of course addressed to the States, but also to the Court, and at the end of the conference decisions were taken allowing the Court to fully play its part in implementation. The avenues mapped out are numerous: simplification of the procedure for amending the European Convention on Human Rights with the creation of a Statute for the Court approved and modified by resolution of the Committee of Ministers; strengthening of the subsidiarity principle which implies shared responsibility between the States and the Court; increasing the clarity and consistency of the case-law, which must be as clearly explained as possible. One of the other results of the Interlaken Conference has been the creation of a Panel of Experts on the appointment of judges to the European Court of Human Rights. This Panel, which I had advocated and whose composition has been decided by the Committee of Ministers, will certainly contribute, through the opinions it will give to the States, to endowing the Court with judges having all the requisite expertise. This is especially important since the Court’s authority depends to a large extent on the quality of the judges who are members of it. There are going to be a large number of new judges arriving in the next two years, in particular because the term of office, which is now nine years, is no longer renewable. The Panel will thus have a crucial role to play. 5 European Court of Human Rights – Annual Report 2010 (provisional version) Foreword An important aspect of the Action Plan concerns the role of the Court in providing information to applicants about the Convention and the case-law. That information is indispensable for the implementation of the Convention at domestic level. The Court has therefore set about the task of improving the HUDOC database. This should be facilitated by voluntary contributions from a number of States. Factsheets have also been launched and are regularly updated and supplemented by other information sheets. These can be found on the Court’s website. Initial reactions have been very favourable. Lastly, a guide to admissibility criteria is now available to all. It is mainly intended for professionals, such as NGOs and bar associations, and will give them guidance on the procedure before the Court. Informing the public in this way is particularly important given the Court’s ever- increasing caseload. Indeed, as all these changes are being implemented, the Court’s judicial activity has not decreased. By the end of the year we had received 61,300 new applications, a 7% increase in comparison to 2009. In terms of production, the Court had finished processing over 41,000 applications, i.e. an increase of more than 16%. More than 2,600 applications ended in a judgment, which is a 9% increase. The number of communications to the Governments increased by 8% and reached almost 6,700. The major problem is that our backlog is also continuing to grow. By the end of the year it had reached approximately 140,000 applications, which is an increase of 17%. The deficit at the end of 2010 amounted to more than 1,600 applications per month. One of the challenges in the coming years will