Last year, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) registered 839 applications against Moldova, which is a decline of 17% compared with 2015. Despite this reduction, the number of applications submitted to the ECHR against Moldova, compared with the country’s population, is very large. In 2016, the Moldovans went to the ECHR four times more often than the Europeans did on average. The analysis was carried out by the Legal Resources Center of Moldova based on the Court’s report for 2016 and the ECHR’s case law in Moldovan cases.
Chairman of the Legal Resources Center of Moldova Vladislav Gribincea, in a news conference at IPN, said the reduction in the number of applications submitted to the Court in 2016 is most probably not determined by the better observance of the human rights in the Republic of Moldova because no report shows such an evolution. “It is about the decline in the popularity of the ECHR among the Moldovan population, especially lawyers. In 2011-2016, the Court rejected over 8,500 Moldovan applications without clear argumentation,” stated the Center’s head.
Vladislav Gribincea also said that the Moldovans go to the ECHR four times more often compared with the European average. This large figure speaks about distrust in the sentences issued by national courts or about the lack of remedies in the county.
Since 1997 until December 31, 2016, the ECHR passed 339 decisions in Moldovan cases, 23 of which in 2016, by four more than in 2015. In this regard, Moldova outstrips considerably Germany, Spain or the Netherlands, which joined the European Convention on Human Rights long before Moldova. In only 1.9% of the decisions, the Court ascertained that the Republic of Moldova didn’t violate the European Convention.
The most often types of violations ascertained in the Moldovan cases are: nonfulfillment of court decisions, inappropriate investigations of maltreatments and deaths, detention in poor conditions, etc. Based on all the judgments and decisions passed until December 31, 2016, Moldova was obliged to pay over €16.2 million. According to Vladislav Gribincea, this sum is much larger than the whole budget of courts of law for 2015.
Programs director at Promo-Lex Association Alexandru Postica said 25% of all the cases communicated to the Court last year refer to double jurisdiction. These are lawsuits filed by the victims of abuses committed on the left bank of the Nistru against the Republic of Moldova and against Russia. “The given number seems rather high. So, one fourth of the cases communicated in 2016 refer to the violation of the human rights in the Transnistrian region,” stated Alexandru Postica. He also said that the ECHR drew particular conclusions that are very important. One of these is that the Transnistrian courts of law do not have the legal right to order the arrest of persons.
