Please find below a number of newly published readings related to the European Convention on Human Rights and the European Court of Human Rights of the last few months:
● Veronika Fikfak and Lora Izvorova, ‘Language and Persuasion: Human Dignity at the European Court of Human Rights’, Human Rights Law Review, Volume 22, Issue 3 (2022):
‘Although the concept of human dignity is absent from the text of the European Convention on Human Rights, it is mentioned in more than 2100 judgments of the European Court of Human Rights. The judges at the Court have used dignity to develop the scope of Convention rights, but also to signal to respondent states just how serious a violation is and to nudge them toward better compliance. However, these strategies reach dead ends when the Court is faced with government submissions that are based on a conception of dignity that is different from the notion of human dignity relied on by the Court. Through empirical analysis and by focusing on Russia, the country against which the term dignity is used most frequently, the paper maps out situations of conceptual contestation and overlap. We reveal how the Court strategically uses mirroring, substitutes dignity for other Convention values, or altogether avoids confrontation. In such situations, the Court’s use (and non-use) of dignity becomes less about persuading states to comply with the Convention and more about preserving its authority and managing its relationship with states.’
● Dr. Maria-Louiza Deftou, ‘The Road to the EU’s Accession to the ECHR: Reshaping the ECtHR-CJEU Judicial Interaction in Cases of ‘Unwanted Migration’?’, International Community Law Review, Issue 24 (2022):
‘The dual European judicial protection of fundamental rights with the two Courts, namely the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), represents a multi-layered, yet dialectic, model of protection with no formal hierarchy between its components. In the aftermath of Opinion 2/13 and faced with uncontrolled ‘unwanted migration’ flows, the EU judicature defended the principle of mutual trust at any cost and appeared to prioritise the protection of the Dublin regime (the EU responsibility allocation mechanism for examining asylum applications) instead of addressing the novel human rights challenges facing the Common European Asylum System (CEAS). Yet, their interplay has entered a new era since the renegotiation of the EU’s accession to the ECHR launched. By analysing the case law of the two Courts, this article thinks anew their relationship to ascertain whether the evolution of the accession project, throughout the latest decade, has affected the protection offered to ‘unwanted migrants’ in Europe.’
● Laura-Stella Enonchong, ‘Public prosecutors and the right to personal liberty: An analysis of the jurisprudence of the UN Human Rights Committee and the European Court of Human Rights’, Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights, Vol. 40, Issue 3 (2022) pp. 222-243:
‘This article discusses the approach of the United Nations Human Rights Committee (HRC) and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) to interpreting and applying the right to personal liberty, in particular in relation to the judicial control of the deprivation of liberty. It appears that both institutions adopt an interpretative approach that aligns with the object and purpose of the right. However, in the application to individual cases, unlike the ECtHR, the HRC fails to clarify the scope of the relevant provision of the ICCPR, specifically, the independence and impartiality of the public prosecutor as ‘an other officer authorised by law to exercise judicial power’. That situation may ultimately undermine a more effective attainment of the object and purpose of the right to personal liberty. The article argues for the HRC to adopt a more systematic approach to interpreting and applying that right in particular and the provisions of the ICCPR in general.’
