Friday 5 July 2019

Information on Involvement of Civil Society and NHRIs in Execution of Judgments Phase

While in law schools we tend to focus ourselves and our students on the judgments of the Court (and so do many practitioners), a crucial phase, that of implementation, of course only starts after a judgment has been delivered. In the ECHR system, the Committee of Ministers is tasked with the supervision of the execution of judgments. It is supported in that role by the Council of Europe's Department for the Execution of Judgments. Since 'ears and eyes' on the ground are often very useful to provide context and addition information, this post-judgment phase allows for a degree of involvement of civl society nad national human rights institutions (NHRIs). The Department has now launched a special web page which gives an overview of how to do this. Since this information was previously not easily available, this is a very useful resource, which has come about at the request of civil society itself. The page includes an Information Note on best practices of how and when to address the Committee of Ministers. It also includes a useful flowchart of the timeline as well as the possibility to subscribe to an RSS feed to remain updated on relevant cases. Thus, the website reflects an important improvement in terms of information and accessibility, although additions would still be useful, according to the European Implementation Network.

And a small note: this is the 1001st post on this ECHR blog since its inception!

Monday 1 July 2019

CoE Book on Individual Application under the ECHR

The President of the European Court of Human Rights, Linos-Alexandra Sicilianos, and Maria-Andriani Kostopoulou, a lawyer at the Greek Court of Cassation, have co-authored a new concise book (180 pages), entitled The individual application under the European Convention on Human Rights. It has just been published with the Council of Europe. This is the publisher's abstract:

'An indispensable practical guide for any potential applicant and any legal professional.

This book, which is a practical guide aimed at both professional lawyers and potential applicants, clearly and comprehensively describes and analyses the main stages in the processing of an application before the organs of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Detailed descriptions are provided of the Convention system, the Rules of the European Court of Human Rights and the procedures which the Court has developed to expedite and optimise case processing.

Crafted by two specialists on the Convention, Linos-Alexandre Sicilianos, the current President of the European Court of Human Rights, and Maria-Andriani Kostopoulou, a lawyer at the Greek Court of Cassation, the book does not merely explain how to prepare and lodge an application, in particular as regards the formal requirements and admissibility criteria; it also presents a detailed assessment of a case by the various formations of the Court, covering all stages right through to the conclusion of proceedings. Finally, having analysed the judicial stage, the book goes on to describe the procedure for supervision of the execution of judgments before the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe.'