CYIL 2012

ĽUBOMÍR MAJERČÍK ȃ ANNA MATUŠINOVÁ ȃ HUBERT SMEKAL CYIL 3 ȍ2012Ȏ Findings of rather lower-intensity violations of rights go hand in hand with a modest contribution to the “hall of fame” judgments of the ECtHR. The Czech Republic appeared before the Grand Chamber only once in the last decade, but the infamous case D.H. and Others v the Czech Republic, 8 dealing with the discrimination of Roma children in the right to education, brought a lot of attention. In the last ten years, the Czech Republic contributed to the ECtHR’s database with 14 cases indexed “1”, i.e. with high importance. But even these judgments “which the Court considers make a significant contribution to the development, clarification or modification of its case-law, either generally or in relation to a particular State” 9 have not stirred any controversy in Strasbourg. Despite the strong characteristics of Importance 1 cases, the judgments concerning the Czech Republic were adopted without separate opinions with the sole exception of the D.H. and Others , where one can find dissents both in the Chamber and Grand Chamber judgments. 3. Overview of 2011 cases In 2011 the Court faced the arrival of two groups of applications against the Czech Republic. The first group involved applications raising issues that had already been dealt with and had not been satisfactorily resolved before Czech courts since then. They are usually linked to specific problems of Czech laws or practice and do not reflect any serious challenges emerging elsewhere in Europe. They are but a constant remainder of the loopholes to be closed. The second group consists of applications presenting new issues in respect of the Czech Republic. Either the Czech courts have already been grappling with them but they have not yet reached the Strasbourg level ( Andrle v the Czech Republic ), 10 or they are examples of unencountered excesses which often occur on the European level ( Diallo v the Czech Republic ). 11 In the following pages we will offer a brief overview both of the repetitive cases and of the novel ones. We will focus on the cases that were dealt with only before the Chamber and were examined on the merits. The judgments will be presented in chronological order and only complaints that were found admissible will be mentioned. 4. The uneasy access to the Constitutional Court The first set of repetitive cases covers a right to a contradictory hearing under Article 6 of the Convention. In the cases of Hubka and Palšovič 12 the applicants, members of armed forces, brought proceedings seeking their military pensions. The Constitutional Court of the Czech Republic, faced with their constitutional appeals, requested observations from the Ministry of Defence and the Supreme 8 D.H. and Others v Czech Republic App no 57325/00 (ECHR, 13 November 2007). 9 Cited from the HUDOC explanation – HUDOC ECHR Search Portal, accessed 27 May 2012. 10 Andrle v the Czech Republic App no 6268/08 (ECHR, February 2011). 11 Diallo v the Czech Republic App no 20493/07 (ECHR, June 2011). 12 Hubka v the Czech Republic App no 500/06 (ECHR, February 2011) , Palšovič v the Czech Republic App no 39278/04 (ECHR, February 2011).

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