No bronze medal called for

At the annual press conference given by the European Court of Human Rights, the Court’s President Jean-Paul Costa reported that the annual table of violations and Survey of activities showed that Turkey had the highest number of judgments with at least one violation of the Convention being found.  It was followed by Russia,(175), Ukraine (108), Poland (101) and Romania (88).

Mr Costa said that that the number of pending cases before the Court had risen 15%. While the total number of judgments delivered by the Court in 2007 was 1503, fewer than the 1560 delivered in 2006, the said that this was the result of the Court’s decision to focus on the more complex and serious cases, which took longer to process.

The greatest disappointment in 2007, Mr Costa stated, had been Russia’s refusal to ratify Protocol No. 14 to the European Convention on Human Rights, thus blocking its entry into force. Protocol No. 14 is essentially a package of measures to streamline the Court’s procedures and speed up the treatment of cases. Its non-ratification meant, among other things, that many judges whose terms of office could have been extended by two or three years would be replaced in the course of the year, inevitably slowing down the Court’s efficiency.

Mr Costa said that he hoped 2008 would become a “Year of Hope”, with alternatives being found to Protocol No. 14, efforts at national level to implement the Court’s judgments and prevent human rights abuses

From the ECHR’s press release available, together with the statistics mentioned, at www.echr.coe.int