Cross-Border Surrogacy Before the European Court of Human Rights: Analysis of Valdís Fjölnisdóttir And Others v Iceland

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-23
Author(s):  
Lydia Bracken
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Recent Case ◽  
Member States ◽  
Cross Border ◽  
Rights Of The Child ◽  
European Court

Abstract The recent case of Valdís Fjölnisdóttir and Others v Iceland adds to the emerging ECtHR jurisprudence on cross-border surrogacy. It reinforces principles established in previous cases and, in doing so, clarifies the scope of the child’s rights under Article 8 ECHR, and hence clarifies the scope of the obligations placed on Member States in cases of cross-border surrogacy. At the same time, consideration of Valdís Fjölnisdóttir reveals significant omissions in the approach adopted by the ECtHR as regards consideration of the rights of the child. In this way, aspects of Valdís Fjölnisdóttir confuse, rather than clarify, the scope of the child’s Article 8 ECHR rights in cases of cross-border surrogacy. This article examines the Valdís Fjölnisdóttir judgment with a view to identifying emerging principles, as well as contradictions, in the developing body of jurisprudence relating to cross-border surrogacy.

The Best Interests of the Child

2020 ◽  
pp. 203-221
Author(s):  
Wouter Vandenhole ◽  
Gamze Erdem Türkelli
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Family Law ◽  
Children's Rights ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Children’S Rights ◽  
Best Interests ◽  
Rights Of The Child ◽  
European Court ◽  
Elusive Concept

The best interests of the child principle is considered a pillar of children’s rights law and, according to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), is to be a primary consideration in all actions concerning children. Yet best interests is an elusive concept and principle that has no single authoritative definition or description. Internationally and domestically relevant in such diverse areas as family law, adoption, migration, and socioeconomic policymaking, the best interests principle requires flexibility and is best served by a case-by-case approach, as has been recognized by the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child and the European Court of Human Rights. This chapter analyzes relevant international case law and suggests the use of a number of safeguards to prevent such requisite flexibility from presenting a danger of paternalism, bias, or misuse.

scholarly journals Castaño avoids a clash between the ECtHR and the CJEU, but erodes Soering. Thinking human rights transnationally

2020 ◽  
pp. 203228442097974
Author(s):  
Sibel Top ◽  
Paul De Hert
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Union Member ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Member States ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
European Court ◽  
Criminal Matters ◽  
European Union Member States

This article examines the changing balance established by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) between human rights filters to extradition and the obligation to cooperate and how this shift of rationale brought the Court closer to the position of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in that respect. The article argues that the ECtHR initially adopted a position whereby it prioritised human rights concerns over extraditions, but that it later nuanced that approach by establishing, in some cases, an obligation to cooperate to ensure proper respect of human rights. This refinement of its position brought the ECtHR closer to the approach adopted by the CJEU that traditionally put the obligation to cooperate above human rights concerns. In recent years, however, the CJEU also backtracked to some extent from its uncompromising attitude on the obligation to cooperate, which enabled a convergence of the rationales of the two Courts. Although this alignment of the Courts was necessary to mitigate the conflicting obligations of European Union Member States towards both Courts, this article warns against the danger of making too many human rights concessions to cooperation in criminal matters.

Lachiri v Belgium and Bans on Wearing Islamic Dress in the Courtroom: An Emerging Trend

2019 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 48-53
Author(s):  
Kaushik Paul
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Religious Freedom ◽  
Public Spaces ◽  
Religious Liberty ◽  
Recent Case ◽  
European Convention ◽  
European Court ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Right ◽  
Islamic Dress

In recent years, the wearing of Islamic dress in public spaces and elsewhere has generated widespread controversy all over Europe. The wearing of the hijab and other Islamic veils has been the subject of adjudication before the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) on many occasions. The most recent case before the ECtHR as to the prohibition on wearing the hijab is Lachiri v Belgium. In this case, the ECtHR held that a prohibition on wearing the hijab in the courtroom constitutes an infringement of Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), which guarantees the right to freedom of religion or belief. From the perspective of religious freedom, the ruling of the Strasbourg Court in Lachiri is very significant for many reasons. The purpose of this comment is critically to analyse the ECtHR's decision in Lachiri from the standpoint of religious liberty.

Abortion for Foetal Abnormalities in Ireland; The Limited Scope of the Irish Government’s Response to the A, B and C Judgment

2013 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 117-143 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Donoghue ◽  
Claire-Michelle Smyth
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Legal Abortion ◽  
Member States ◽  
Non Invasive ◽  
European Court ◽  
Margin Of Appreciation ◽  
Controversial Topic ◽  
The Government ◽  
Limited Scope

Abstract Abortion has been a controversial topic in Irish law and one which the Government has been forced to address following the decision of the European Court of Human Rights in A, B and C v. Ireland. The Working Group established to make recommendations have specifically been instructed to deal only with the issues raised in the A, B and C judgment and legislate on the basic of the ‘X case’. This restricted approach calls for legalisation of abortion only where the life of the mother is at risk, a position unique only to Ireland and Andorra within Europe. The vast majority of member states to the European Convention on Human Rights allow for legal abortion on the basis of foetal abnormality and with this emerging consensus the margin of appreciation hitherto afforded by the European Court to member states is diminishing. The advancement and availability of non-invasive genetic tests that can determine foetal abnormalities together with the ruling in R. R. v. Poland leaves Ireland in a precarious position for omitting any reference to foetal abnormalities in any proposed legislation.

“Unity in Diversity” Reloaded: The European Court of Human Rights’ Turn to Subsidiarity and its Consequences

2021 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-123
Author(s):  
Mikael Rask Madsen
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Reform Process ◽  
Individual Member ◽  
Member States ◽  
European Court ◽  
Recent Developments ◽  
Unity In Diversity ◽  
The Common ◽  
Individual Justice

Abstract The European Convention of Human Rights system was originally created to sound the alarm if democracy was threatened in the member states. Yet, it eventually developed into a very different system with a focus on providing individual justice in an ever growing number of member states. This transformation has raised fundamental questions as to the level of difference and diversity allowed within the common European human rights space. Was the system to rest on minimum standards with room for domestic differences, or was it to create uniform standards? These questions have come up as increasingly contentious issues over the past years and have triggered a number of reforms seeking to introduce more subsidiarity in the system, striking a different balance between the European and national oversight of human rights. The article analyses this turn to subsidiarity by exploring whether the reform process has introduced new forms of difference and diversity within the common space of European human rights. Covering the period from 2000 to the end of 2019 and using a dataset of all judgments of the period, the article provides a structural analysis of developments in reference to the margin of appreciation which is the European Court of Human Rights’ long-standing tool for balancing the common standards, yet leaving space for individual member states to find local solutions to implementing those standards. It concludes that recent developments have contributed to a more federal-style construction of European human rights with more space for differences within the common general standards.

The Impartiality of International Judges: Evidence from the European Court of Human Rights

2008 ◽  
Vol 102 (4) ◽  
pp. 417-433 ◽  
Author(s):  
ERIK VOETEN
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
National Government ◽  
Judicial Behavior ◽  
Policy Preferences ◽  
Judicial Power ◽  
Government Behavior ◽  
Member States ◽  
European Court ◽  
International Court ◽  
Bright Side

Can international judges be relied upon to resolve disputes impartially? If not, what are the sources of their biases? Answers to these questions are critically important for the functioning of an emerging international judiciary, yet we know remarkably little about international judicial behavior. An analysis of a new dataset of dissents in the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) yields a mixed set of answers. On the bright side, there is no evidence that judges systematically employ cultural or geopolitical biases in their rulings. There is some evidence that career insecurities make judges more likely to favor their national government when it is a party to a dispute. Most strongly, the evidence suggests that international judges are policy seekers. Judges vary in their inclination to defer to member states in the implementation of human rights. Moreover, judges from former socialist countries are more likely to find violations against their own government and against other former socialist governments, suggesting that they are motivated by rectifying a particular set of injustices. I conclude that the overall picture is mostly positive for the possibility of impartial review of government behavior by judges on an international court. Like judges on domestic review courts, ECtHR judges are politically motivated actors in the sense that they have policy preferences on how to best apply abstract human rights in concrete cases, not in the sense that they are using their judicial power to settle geopolitical scores.

scholarly journals 4 The Court and Domestic and International Legal Systems

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nussberger Angelika
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
European Convention ◽  
Vienna Convention ◽  
Legal Systems ◽  
Member States ◽  
Supreme Courts ◽  
European Court ◽  
Set Up ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter assesses the relationship between the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and domestic and international legal systems. With the ratification of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), the Member States accept to be bound by final judgments of the Court and to implement them in their domestic legal systems. The Convention system does not make any difference as to the set-up of the national legal system or to the hierarchical position accorded to the Convention in national law. This is in line with a purist international law perspective, summarized in Article 27 of the Vienna Convention of the Law on Treaties: ‘A party may not invoke the provisions of its internal law as justification for its failure to perform a treaty.’ However, from the constitutional law perspective of the Member States, the situation is much more multi-faceted and complex. While it is generally accepted that the Court's judgments are binding and have to be implemented, the relationship between the Convention and the national constitutions as well as between their respective guardians, the Court on the one hand and national constitutional or supreme courts on the other hand, is not seen as one-way and hierarchical, but nuanced and differentiated. Implementation of judgments is accepted to be a duty, but not necessarily without exceptions. The chapter then considers the relationship between the ECtHR and the European Court of Justice (ECJ).

scholarly journals The right to peaceful enjoyment of property and the security measure of the forfeiture of cash in the jurisprudence of the Serbian Constitutional Court: Certain uncertainty

Pravni zapisi ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 620-644
Author(s):  
Tamás Korhecz
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Property Rights ◽  
Public Interest ◽  
Cash Transfer ◽  
Constitutional Court ◽  
The Public ◽  
Cross Border ◽  
Security Measure ◽  
European Court ◽  
The Right

The right to peaceful enjoyment of property is a first-generation human right, protected by the international and domestic law of the highest rank. This is not an absolute right - the European standards of protecting property rights allow possible interferences prescribed by law. The interferences can be made in the public interest but only under the assumption that the proportionality between the public interest and property rights of individuals at stake is established. Forfeiture of undeclared cash the individuals are transferring across state borders, together with imposing fines for a misdemeanor, represent an interference with individuals' property rights. The EU Member States do not share an identical system of sanctions for this petty offense, but there is a tendency of unification related to the monitoring, registering, and sanctioning of undeclared, cross-border, individual cash transfer. The case-law of the European Court of Human Rights has established rather precise criteria for distinguishing permitted from unpermitted interferences in cases of undeclared cross-border cash transfers. The Serbian Constitutional Court has been faced with several constitutional complaints regarding alleged unconstitutionally of the imposed security measure amounting to the forfeiture of undeclared cash physically transferred across the state borders. The Constitutional Court has ruled inconsistently on the matter. Although it has regularly referred to the European Court of Human Rights' relevant decisions, it fails to be consistent in following the Strasbourg Court's rulings. In this article, the author has suggested that the legal certainty principle requires the Constitutional Court to consistently interpret the constitutional rights and be systematic in following Strasbourg. Only in this way, the Constitutional Court can help regular courts effectively to harmonize the interpretation and application of laws with the constitutional and international human rights standards regarding property rights.

Physical Education and Religious Freedom

2019 ◽  
pp. 144-155
Author(s):  
Konstantinos Margaritis
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Physical Education ◽  
Religious Freedom ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Democratic Society ◽  
The Other ◽  
Recent Case ◽  
Freedom Of Religion ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
European Court

Freedom of religion has been constantly characterized as one of the foundations of a democratic society. On the other hand, the significance of physical education in the development of children's overall personality is beyond dispute. Thus, the question that arises is, What happens in a case of a conflict involving the above? The aim of this chapter is to provide an answer on the basis of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights. In particular, the fundamental cases of Dogru vs. France and Kervanci vs. France will be examined, as well as the recent case of Osmanoglu and Kocabas vs. Switzerland. Through the analysis of the cases, useful conclusions will be drawn on the possible impact of religious freedom on physical education.

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