Monday, 14 September 2009

Implementation of Judgments Worsening

The implementation of the Court's judgments on the national level is not getting better, to say the least. In fact, 36 of the 47 state parties to the European Convention are now failing to timely implement the Court's judgments. Those are the main conclusions of a report presented last week by Parliamentary Assembly rapporteur Christos Pourgourides. The report is based on a list which shows countries which have either not fully implemented within five years (paying of compensation and/or change or policy or laws) or which "reveal major structural problems". According to the rapporteur this is much worse than previously. He has drawn up a list of problematic implementation cases. One may note that the list contains state parties from all over Europe, both from from original signatories of the Convention and from more recently ratifying countries. All in all, a very worryig trend. Mr Pourgourides rightly calls on his PACE colleagues to raise this matter in their national parliaments.