Latest posts
U.S. Supreme Court and ECtHR: Conflicts between Religious Autonomy and Other Fundamental Rights
Cases involving conflicts between religious autonomy and other rights such as non-discrimination and respect for private life seem to be gaining more and more prominence in different parts of the world. One recent example is the U.S. Supreme Court’...
Less stringent measures and migration detention: overruling Saadi v. UK?
The recent cases of Yoh-Ekale Mwanje v. Belgium and Popov v. France illustrate how a ‘less stringent measures test’ is entering the Court’s reasoning under Art. 5 § 1 ECHR in migration detention cases. The Court appears to be slowly moving awa...
Competing Interests in Paternity Cases: Iyilik v. Turkey
Facts The recent judgment of Iyilik v. Turkey concerns competing interests of an applicant and his (legal) daughter in a paternity case. The wife of the applicant, Mr. Iyilik, had given birth to a daughter in 1966. Mr. Iyilik denied being the biologi...
Strasbourg Court condemns Belgian internment policy
On 6 December 2011, the European Court of Human Rights found the Belgian internment policy to be in breach of the ECHR. The case of De Donder and De Clippel v. Belgium concerned Tom De Clippel, a mentally ill person who had committed suicide while in...
The Strasbourg Court and the Arab Spring
International politics are never far away in cases dealing with the extradition of individuals to third countries. In the case of Al Hanchi v. Bosnia and Herzegovina the European Court of Human Rights was confronted with an extradition of a so-called...
French Roma policy violates European Social Charter
In a decision of 28 June (COHRE v. France, no. 63/2010), which was only recently made public, the European Committee of Social Rights has found the French zero tolerance policy towards East European Roma living in illegal camps to be in violation of...
Turkish Law Criminalising “Denigration of Turkish Nation” Overbroad and Vague
This guest post is co-authored by Rónán Ó Fathaigh and Chris Wiersma, two colleagues from the Human Rights Centre. More information on Rónán and Chris can be found on the website of the Center for Journalism Studies of Ghent University, here I...
Toward an Anti-Stereotyping Approach for the ECtHR
As part of our joint research project I have written an article on gender stereotyping and the ways this could be addressed by the European Court of Human Rights in its case law. Now I’m not sure whether flagging my own research is correct blog...
Deference or Substantive Resolution? The ECJ’s Brüstle Judgment on the Use of Human Embryos for Scientific Research
This post was co-authored by Wannes Van Hoof* and Stijn Smet. Recently, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) was asked to deliver a preliminary ruling on the use of human embryos for scientific research. The case concerned an application by Greenpeace...
Court condemns forced sterilization of Roma woman
This post is co-authored by Lourdes Peroni and Alexandra Timmer The Court has recently ruled in V.C. v. Slovakia, a case brought by a Roma woman who complained that she was sterilized without her informed consent. The judgment is no doubt a landmark...
S.H. and Others v Austria: margin of appreciation and IVF
In Austria, it is forbidden to use donated sperm or ova for in vitro fertilization (‘IVF’). Ovum donation is under all circumstances prohibited; sperm donation is only possible when the sperm is directly placed in the womb of a woman (in vivo art...
Trafficking in Persons and the European Court of Human Rights
This guest post was written by Dr. Roberta Avellino. Dr. Avellino studied Law at the University of Malta where she graduated as Doctor of Laws. She has moreover obtained a Master of Laws in International Law following research on trafficking in perso...
Ambit and Scope of Article 8 in Citizenship Cases
In a recent judgment in the case of Genovese v. Malta the Court gave very few words when determining the scope and ambit of Article 8. The Court managed to exclude a right, find no violation and determine the scope in the same sentence, and, in cont...
Bah v UK: on immigration, discrimination and worrisome reasoning
This post was co-authored by Lourdes Peroni and Alexandra Timmer The Court recently ruled on the case of Ms. Bah, a Sierra Leonean woman with indefinite leave to remain in the UK, who asserted that she was discriminated against in the allocation of s...
Karttunen v. Finland: Child Pornography and Freedom of Expression
Today’s guest post was written by Rónán Ó Fathaigh, one of our colleagues at the Human Rights Centre. More information on Rónán can be found on the website of the Center for Journalism Studies of Ghent University, here. In a recent admissibili...
The right to bury one’s relatives
In a recent judgement in the case of Girard v. France (in French) the Court recognized a new right under Article 8 – the right to bury one’s relatives. This case involved three aspects of dealing with an individual’s remains under the Convent...
Stummer v. Austria: gradually moving towards a right to an old-age pension for working prisoners?
By Ingrid Leijten. Ingrid Leijten works as a Ph.D. fellow and teaching assistant at the Leiden University Faculty of Law, Department of Constitutional and Administrative Law. Her research interest lies in the development of the ECHR and the practice...
A Poll on Palomo Sánchez
We are pleased to be organising our first poll to ask our readers about their opinion! The poll concerns the recent judgment of Palomo Sánchez v. Spain in which the Grand Chamber of the Court ruled that the Spanish courts had not failed their positi...
When is Family Life Family Life? A Look at Deportation Cases
In A.A. v. the United Kingdom, a recent case involving the deportation of a young Nigerian man, the Court faced, once again, the question whether relationships between adult children and parents/siblings amount to family life in deportation cases. Th...
Blood Donations and the Permanent Exclusion of “Men Who Have Sex with Men”
In Belgium, as in many other European countries, homosexual men are not allowed to donate blood. To be more precise, not homosexual men are permanently excluded from donating blood, but “men who have sex with men”. “What’s in a name?”, you...
