NGOs under European Convention on Human Rights / Tymofeyeva

In the case of Herbecq and Association “Ligue des droits de l‘homme” v. Belgium , the applicant association alleged that there was no legislative provision governing video surveillance in Belgium. In its opinion, such a situation constituted an interference with its aims and objectives, which included the defence of the principles of equality, freedom and humanism stemming from the Convention. In response, the Commission pointed out: “The applicant association itself cannot be the subject of any surveillance measure…”. 739 It added that there was nothing to prevent an association from acting on behalf of a certain number of individuals. The only condition is that the applicant association had to identify them and show that it had received specific instructions from each of them. This case shows that it is not always clear whether Article 34 NGOs may be subject to secret surveillance directly. 2.4.2.3 Common submissions Given that the number of judgments regarding complaints under Article 8 lodged by non-governmental organisations in the sense of Article 34 of the Convention is to some extent limited, we decided to also include in the book the cases where both legal and natural persons submitted the applications, but the Court focused on the rights of individuals. This part includes different types of alleged violations. We will start with secret surveillance measures. The case of Telegraaf Media Nederland Landelijke Media B.V. and Others v. the Netherlands 740 concerned the surveillance of journalists and an order for them to surrender documents capable of identifying their sources. The case originated from an application lodged by a legal person and individuals. The first applicant was a limited liability company incorporated under Netherlands law. The second and the third applicants were Netherlands nationals employed as journalists. Two associations with legal personality under Netherlands law, Nederlandse Vereniging van Journalisten (Netherlands Association of Journalists) and Nederlands Genootschap van Hoofdredacteuren (Netherlands Society of Editors-in-Chief), also were among the applicants in the case. Nonetheless, the Court mentioned them only in the beginning of the judgment and did not refer to them throughout the text of this judicial decision. As to the issue of secret surveillance, the Court found a violation of Article 8 in conjunction with Article 10 in respect of the second and third applicants, namely individuals. 741 The applicant company itself did not raise a complaint alleging a violation of its rights under this provision of the Convention. Nevertheless, this case deserves an examination because, as it was shown above, Article 34 NGO may be subject to this type of violation. While considering complaints under Article 8 in this case, the Court observed that although questions raised by surveillance measures were usually considered under Article 8 alone, in the present case they were so intertwined with the Article 10 issue that the Court found it appropriate to consider

739 Herbecq and Association “Ligue des droits de l’homme”, cited above. 740 Telegraaf Media Nederland Landelijke Media B.V., cited above. 741

Court judgement in Dutch media freedom human rights row (online). URL: accessed 20 July 2015.

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