EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN ACTION / Alla Tymofeyeva (ed.)

births with the assistance of a midwife ( Dubská and Krejzová v. the Czech Republic , no. 28859/11 and 28473/12, judgment [GC] of 15 November 2016), lack of access to classified information in the judicial proceedings ( Regner v. the Czech Republic , no. 35289/11, judgment [GC] of 19 September 2017), or a system of compulsory vaccination ( Vavřička and Others v. the Czech Republic , no. 47621/13 and 5 Others, judgment [GC] of 8 April 2021). 4. EXECUTION OF JUDGMENTS However, the agenda of the Office of the Government Agent is not limited to representing the State before the Court. It also initiates the adoption of general measures aimed at ensuring the compliance of the legal order with the Convention, both ex post in the case of judgments of the Court finding violations of the Convention by the Czech Republic and ex ante based on ongoing monitoring and analysis of the Court’s case law in relation to other States. Strictly speaking, the case law of the Court is binding only in a specific case and between parties to the proceedings in question. By adjudicating individual cases, however, the Court gives an authoritative interpretation of the Convention. It is primarily due to the Court’s decision-making activity that provisions of the Convention acquire a specific content and meaning, which then serve as the European minimum standards for the protection of fundamental rights. The interpretation of a provision developed by the Court in an individual case then has unquestionable relevance for deciding similar cases in the future. Thus, by reason of a case previously interpreted, case law against third countries may also be of importance for the assessment of similar-type cases. Hence, the Court’s case law has a broader normative binding force. Depending on the circumstances, even judgments against other States may be relevant for the Czech authorities. Under Article 46 § 1 of the Convention, States shall undertake to abide by the final judgments of the Court in any case to which they are parties. In practice, it means that the State must remedy the situation by adopting both individual and general measures. While the purpose of individual means of remedy is to restore the applicant’s situation to the state before the violation of his or her rights occurred ( restitution in integrum ), the rationale behind general measures is to prevent the recurrence of similar violations of the Convention in the future. The most frequent individual measures are the payment of just satisfaction awarded by the Court and provision of possibility to seek the re-opening of the domestic proceedings (see Section 119 of Act No. 182/1993, on the Constitutional Court, as amended). Depending on the circumstances, other individual measures such as the restitution of property or release from detention may be considered. General means of remedy may take the form of amending legislation or domestic courts’ decision-making or drawing up guidelines on the proper professional conduct of the authority concerned. In any event, the States enjoy a wide latitude as to the choices of both individual and general measures they deem necessary for proper implementation of the Court’s judgments. Nonetheless, their choices are subject to external scrutiny carried out by the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe. Accordingly, within the period of six month from the finality of the judgment, the Government is required to report to Committee of Ministers. If the Government considers that they have fully complied with the judgment, they submit the so-called action report summarizing the measures taken. Otherwise, they inform the Committee of Ministers of the intended measures to be taken in the form of an action plan. Once the Committee of Ministers is satisfied that all necessary measures for a proper execution of the judgment have been taken, it adopts a resolution confirming that it has fulfilled its function, thus closing the supervision of the execution of the judgment. For analysis of the Court’s judgments and formulation of general measures to be taken by the Czech authorities, the Government Agent has set up his advisory body called the College of Experts for the Execution of the Court’s judgments. It is composed of representatives of all ministries, both chambers of the Parliament, the highest courts, the Public Prosecutor’s Office,

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