Case summaries
The applicant was the leader of the PKK and the most wanted person in Turkey. He was arrested and sentenced to the death penalty. Breaches of Articles 3, 5 and 6 were found with regard to his detention, the imposition of the death penalty and his rights as the defence to a fair trial.
After the revocation of his residence permit due to his religious activities (alleged links with a fundamentalist organisation), the applicant was detained for a period of 26 days and later deported from Bulgaria. The applicant claims to have been refused access to a lawyer and to have been detained incommunicado. He also claims that his detention and deportation was an interference with his right to family life and right to religious freedom.
The applicants were unlawfully detained and had no effective remedy to challenge their detention. There was a finding that they had been collectively expelled, given the context of their expulsion along with many others of the same nationality, and as their individual circumstances had not been adequately taken into consideration.
The European Court of Human Rights found an infringement of the applicants’ right to respect for their family life, guaranteed by Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, on account of the rejection of their application for a residence permit for their daughter.
The present case, which ended in a friendly settlement between the parties, concerned the allegations of a Russian national that he would be exposed to ill-treatment if expelled to Russia.
The European Court of Human Rights ruled that the proposed expulsion of a Tanzanian national from the United Kingdom to Tanzania will expose him to inhuman and degrading treatment, in violation of Article 3 of the Convention.
Turkey’s continual and severe failure to carry out an effective investigation into the circumstances of disappearance of Greek-Cypriots, who were at the time under the control of its agents, constituted a violation of Articles 2,3 and 5 of the ECHR. The circumscription of freedom of movement, religion and association of Greek-Cypriots in Northern Greece constituted violations of Articles 9 and 10 and the continual violation of Article 1 Protocol 1 by virtue of preventing Greek Cypriot owners from having access to, control and use of their property was also found by the Court.
The proposed deportation of the applicant to Iran would violate Article 3 ECHR, and as she was prevented from having the merits of her claim examined due to non-compliance with procedural time limits, there was a breach of Article 13 ECHR. This was because she had no chance to challenge the decision on appeal, or access to a remedy with suspensive effect.