NGOs under European Convention on Human Rights / Tymofeyeva

and 4) correspondence . 698 There exist also discussions as to a separate right to reputation. 699 However, in the case of Petrina v. Romania , the Court clearly stated that this is only an element of the right to private life. 700 The other element of the right to private life is a one‘s right to name. 701 At the moment, however, there is no case-law in respect of legal persons where the Court has decided on this issue. 702 Therefore, it is hard to say whether the right to business name is guaranteed by Article 8. Authors of the manual on the Convention, entitled Law of the European Convention on Human Rights , write about the following elements of the right to private life: right to personal identity, moral and physical integrity, private space, collection and use of information, sexual activities and social life. 703 Some of these could also easily be invoked by business entities. Consequently, Article 34 NGOs, in theory, may allege a violation of their right to ‘private life’. Before starting the analysis of the applicability of the private life guarantees to Article 34 NGOs, it should be noted that the Court elaborated a special approach in its examination of Articles 8, 9, 10 and 11 of the Convention. All of these Articles of the Convention contain two paragraphs and the approach is based on the structure of the Articles in question. The first paragraph of each Article defines the right, and the second paragraph sets forth the permissible restrictions. 704 On many occasions, the Court found that, in view of the fundamental nature of the Convention rights, the first paragraph should be widely interpreted or can be ‘stretched’, and the second one narrowly interpreted, or the limitations must be limited. 705 In the course of the examination of this issue, the Court posed a number of questions relating to ‘law’, ‘legitimate aim’, ‘necessity’ and ‘proportionality’, in a certain order. The exact formulation of the questions may be differentiated from case to case; nevertheless, a list of the following questions could be considered a basic standard. It shows a line of sight in the Court’s consideration. This list of the Court’s standard questions in the examination of cases under Articles 8-11 of the Convention is as follows : 698 ROAGNA, I. Protecting the right to respect for private and family life under the European Convention on Human Rights . Council of Europe human rights handbooks. Strasbourg: Council of Europe, 2012, p. 9. 699 SMET, S. The Right to Reputation under the European Convention on Human Rights. URL: < http:// strasbourgobservers.com/2010/11/01/the-right-to-reputation-under-the-european-convention-on human-rights/> and ROGERS, H. “Is there a right to reputation?” URL: < https://inforrm.wordpress. com/2010/10/26/is-there-a-right-to-reputation-part-1-heather-rogers-qc/> accessed 20 July 2015. 700 Petrina v. Romania , no. 78060/01, § 28, 14 October 2008. 701 DE SCHUTTER, O. L’accès des personnes morales à la Cour européenne des droits de l’homme . Avancées et confi ns actuels des droits de l’homme aux niveaux international, européen et national: mélanges offerts a Silvio Marcus Helmons. Bruxelles: Bruylant, 2003, p. 95. 702 Data valid on 19 June 2015. 703 HARRIS, 2009, cited above, pp. 364-371. 704 HOFFMAN, D. and ROWE, J. Human rights in the UK : an introduction to the Human Rights Act 1998 . New York : Pearson Longman, 2009, p. 122. 705 ECHR – Introduction. URL: < http://echr-online.info/echr-introduction/> accessed 20 July 2015.

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