European Human Rights Protection System: The Council of Europe and The European Court of Human Rights

The mechanism is maintained by the ECrtHR, which has delivered more than 10.000 judgments since it was first established in 1959. There is no doubt that its case-law has been influential in promoting, expanding and strengthening respect to human rights and basic freedoms, the rule of law, fair trial, justice and democracy in Europe. Besides, eradication of death penalty in the wider Europe and the struggle against torture and inhuman treatments are most the praised contributions of the Council.

The CoE, which introduces itself as “the continent’s leading human rights organisation” was founded on 5 May 1949 by the Treaty of London that officially “constitute the Statute of the Council of Europe”.

The Statute of the CoE was signed on 5 May 1949.

The Statute of the CoE is signed on 5 May 1949 by ten States, namely Belgium, Denmark, France, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Iceland, Greece, West Germany and Turkey joined the original signatories within a year and therefore regarded by some as founding members. The Council has 47 members as of 2019. Canada, Vatican, Japan, Mexico and the US are Observer States, whereas Israel is Observer to the Parliamentary Assembly.

As all international organisations, the CoE has its own authorities and organs. The principal ones that play a role in the human rights protection mechanism are the Secretary-General, the Committee of Ministers, the Parliamentary Assembly, the Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of Europe, the Venice Commission and, above all, the European Court of Human Rights-ECrtHR.

The Secretary-General, who is elected for a term of five years by the Parliamentary Assembly, leads and represents the Council. S/he is expected to supervise the routine operation of the organisation.

Although The Secretary-General leads and represents the Council. S/he is expected to supervise the routine operation of the organisation. Yet the main decision and policy making body of the Council is the Committee of Ministers. 

The main decision and policy making body of the Council is the Committee of Ministers. It officially comprises the ministers of foreign affairs of the member States who are ordinarily represented by their accredited permanent diplomatic representatives based in Strasbourg. Presided by each member for a period of six months on a rotating basis in alphabetical order, the Committee meets weekly, whereas meetings at ministerial level are convened once a year. The Committee has a crucial role in monitoring the practices of States regarding the protected rights and values. In that vein, it supervises the execution of the judgments of the ECrtHR. It has the responsibility and duty to “consider the action required to further the aim of the CoE, including the conclusion of conventions or agreements and the adoption by Governments of a common policy with regard to particular matters.” (Article 15). Finally, it is the body that decides whether to accept (“invite”) a new member to the CoE.

The Parliamentary Assembly (PACE), which is generally seen as the “public face” and even the “motor” of the Council. The Assembly consists of 324 members of parliament from the 47 member States representing some 800 million people.

The Assembly describes itself as a forum for debate that brings together 324 members of parliaments of the 47 member States. Its mission is to uphold the shared values of human rights, democracy and the rule of law that are the common heritage of the peoples of Europe. To that end, it monitors the human rights records of the member States and encourages them to improve their laws and practices.Carrying on its work on political issues with unbinding decisions, it is sometimes criticized of not being bold and influential enough.

The Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of Europe (also known as the Congress of the Council of Europe) was created in 1994 as a consultative body in line with increasing importance of regional and local participation and governance. All local and regional authorities in the member states are represented in the Congress.

The European Commission for Democracy through Law, generally known as the Venice Commission as it meets in Venice, is an advisory body of the CoE on constitutional matters. Its main working areas are democratic institutions and fundamental rights, constitutional justice and ordinary justice, and elections, referendums and political parties. In this context, it provides member States with legal advice in bringing their administration into line with adopted standards and best practices. With its 62 assigned members acting in their individual capacity including scholars, judges and the like from member States as well as other 15 States, the Commission is usually expected to provide “emergency constitutional aid”. Depending on the conjunctural or structural changes, such advice are welcomed by some whereas criticisms are also raised particularly by diverging authorities.

Any application against third States or individuals would be declared inadmissible.

As a great majority of the applications so far have been lodged by individuals, the individual application procedure constitutes the bulk of the workload of the Court.

Any natural or legal person, including group of individuals, companies and NGOs, may lodge a case against any State Party alleging that the latter violated one or more of their rights and guarantees set out in the Convention or its Protocols.

Some of the basic rights protected by the ECHR and its Protocols are:

- the right to life;

- the right to a fair trial;

- the right to respect for private and family life;

- freedom of thought, conscience and religion;

- freedom of expression;

- the right to freedom of assembly and association;

- the right to an effective remedy;

- the right to the peaceful enjoyment of possessions; and - the right to vote and to stand for election.

The ECHR and its Protocols prohibits the following:

- the right to vote and to stand for election.

- death penalty;

- torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment;

- slavery and forced labour;

As a sign of the importance attached to the Court’s accessibility, applications prepared in any one of the official languages of the States Parties may be made directly by individuals and the assistance of a lawyer is not necessary at least at the application stage.

The admissibility decision used to be given unanimously by a three-judge committee up until 2010. This effectively meant that even in cases where only one of the three judges had seen some merits in it unlike the other two, the application was declared admissible. Thus the Court was ensuring everyone that even a slight probability of abuse was taken seriously and scrutinised. However, Protocol 14 that entered into force in 2010 in the name of reducing the workload of the Court has made a dramatic, and in fact controversial, change in the admissibility process. The applications are now being examined by a single-judge formation. “A single judge may declare inadmissible or strike out of the Court’s list of cases” and “the decision shall be final”.

Aiming to solve its workload problem, the Court has developed a new procedure regarding “applications concerning similar issues, also known as ‘systemic issues’ – i.e. those that arise from non-conformity of domestic law with the Convention”. It examines “one or more applications of this kind, whilst its examination of a series of similar cases is adjourned (in other words, postponed).” Once a judgement is given in a so-called “pilot case”, the Court “calls on the Government concerned to bring the domestic legislation into line with the Convention and indicates the general measures to be taken. It will then proceed to dispose of the other similar cases” (CoE, 2014, 10).