Case summaries
The detention conditions, to which the applicants had been subjected to in police stations, while being under protective custody as unaccompanied minors, violated Article 3 ECHR. Violation of Article 3 in conjunction with Article 13 on account of the applicants’ inability to bring a complaint against the detention conditions.
Their placement in protective custody was an unlawful detention measure under Article 5, as there were no time limits, no vulnerability assessment and no consideration of this form of custody as one of last resort. The applicants had no possibility to exercise their rights under Article 5 (4), as they could not establish contact with their lawyer and the lack of official detainee status would have raised practical obstacles in any attempt to challenge their detention.
The Court indicated interim measures (under Rule 39) to Russia after the order of removal of a Syrian national who applied for asylum after the expiry of his student visa. Subsequently, the applicant applied to the Court against the Russian Federation claiming that Russia had breached his rights under Articles 2, 3, 5(1)(f) and 5(4) of the Convention.
The refusal of an entry decision given to an unaccompanied child at the Franco-Italian border is manifestly unlawful and constitutes a severe breach of the applicant’s interest.
In the case of doubts about family relationships, both the Federal Office for Immigration and Asylum (BFA) and the Austrian embassy abroad must for the purpose of family reunification enable applicants to have a DNA-analysis carried out at their request and inform them of this possibility. The purpose of this DNA-analysis is to enable the applicant to eliminate existing doubts about a family relationship and thus to achieve family reunification.
The ECtHR ruled that there had not been a violation of Article 5(1) ECHR in the applicant’s detention at the VIAL hotspot, a day after the entry into force of the EU-Turkey Statement. It also ruled that the threshold of severity required for their detention conditions to be considered as inhuman or degrading treatment had not been reached.
However, the ECtHR found that Greece violated the applicant’s rights under Article 5(2) by not providing them with detailed, understandable information about the reasons for their detention and the remedies available to them.
For the assumption of reasonable internal flight alternatives, a case-by-case assessment must be made on the basis of sufficient findings about the expected situation of the asylum applicant in the country of origin. On the basis of general information on the situation in the country of origin, a young, healthy man with school education and professional experience and who is familiar with the local conditions, can in principle be expected to resettle in Kabul.
To not allow young adults who have been refused asylum to terminate their studies deprives Article 8 ECHR of all weight, an Article which protects an individual’s professional training and personal development. Even if the right to stay of a student is not protected by Article 8, the termination of a qualifying training which is on the horizon falls under the scope of private life within the ECHR. Therefore, the transfer of the applicant to a return centre would prevent her from finishing her schooling, ruining her 7 years of studies and would constitute a harm difficult to repair.
The applicants although minors were detained in a detention facility where they were mixed with adults. The detention lasted until the Maltese government determined (in a process that took 8 months) that they were minors.
Moreover, the harsh conditions in the detention facilities amounted to inhuman or degrading treatment.
The ECtHR argues that the expulsion of a Moroccan National from Sweden to Morocco would represent a breach on article 3 ECHR.
The ECtHR reviewed if the detention of a family with three children in a border police’s detention facility would be considered as a breach of Article 3 ECHR.