CEDH · CASELAW;DECISIONS;ADMISSIBILITYCOM;ENG — 11 septembre 2025

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .sFE10DC93 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s2EF17D91 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center; font-size:2pt } .s5E1364CA { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s339D85E6 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s5FFF0A77 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:1pt } .s10950C61 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sB9D5CABB { width:28.35pt; display:inline-block } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sD6845F38 { font-family:Arial; color:#0072bc } .s3AAE10DF { margin-top:14pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s3CA22BA { font-family:Arial; text-transform:uppercase } .s819344C9 { margin-top:14pt; margin-left:18pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-indent:-18pt; text-align:justify; font-size:14pt } .s2D9C6089 { margin-top:12pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-indent:14.2pt; text-align:justify; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid } .s84651E4E { margin-top:14pt; margin-left:14.2pt; margin-bottom:3pt; text-align:justify } .s69DCC830 { margin-top:36pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sC986E16F { font-family:Arial; color:#ffffff } .s68D1564D { width:34.89pt; display:inline-block } .s28108232 { width:142.78pt; display:inline-block } .s5D826FD4 { width:25.88pt; display:inline-block } .s1B61D60 { width:156.43pt; display:inline-block } .s1721E4C5 { margin-top:14pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt }     FIRST SECTION DECISION Application no. 31652/21 M.G. and L.G. against Croatia   The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting on 11   September 2025 as a Committee composed of:   Erik Wennerström, President ,   Davor Derenčinović,   Alain Chablais , judges , and Liv Tigerstedt, Deputy Section Registrar, Having regard to: the application (no.   31652/21) against the Republic of Croatia lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 16 June 2021 by two Croatian nationals, M.G. and L.G. (“the applicants”), who were born in 2010 and 2005 respectively, live in Croatia and were represented by Mr B. Kozjak, a lawyer practising in Virovitica; the decision to give notice of the application to the Croatian Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, Ms Š. Stažnik; the decision not to have the applicants’ names disclosed; the observations submitted by the parties; the comments submitted by the Human Rights Law Clinic of the Lumsa University, which was granted leave to intervene by the President of the Section; Having deliberated, decides as follows: SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE 1.     The applicants are children of a journalist and an activist in a town in Croatia. The case concerns a Facebook post by a local civil servant stating that the applicants should be taken away from their mother. 2.     On 3 May 2020 the applicants’ mother threw 16 balloons filled with red paint at a historical building in the town. After that she sent an email to the Municipality criticising its work. 3.     On 5 May 2020 a certain M.H., Municipality’s employee, commented on a post on the Municipality’s official Facebook page which was reporting on the restoration of the said building after the incident, that “the social services should take away” the applicants from their mother and that she should thereafter be “imprisoned and sentenced to community work for 40   years”. 4.     On 22 May 2020 the applicants sought to have criminal proceedings instituted against M.H. for the criminal offence of violation of the privacy of children. 5 .     On 26 May 2020 the prosecutor rejected the criminal complaint holding that there was no reasonable suspicion that M.H. had in any way shared any information from the applicants’ personal or family lives thereby jeopardising their privacy or well-being. His statement was merely an expression of his disagreement with the conduct of the applicants’ mother who had caused damage to a cultural heritage monument. 6.     On 2 September 2020 the investigation judge of the Bjelovar County Court rejected the applicants’ proposal for the first questioning of M.H. as unfounded. Their subsequent appeal was dismissed on 24 September 2020. 7.     On 27 November 2020 the applicants lodged a constitutional complaint complaining about a violation of their rights under Articles 8 and 14 of the Convention due to the authorities’ refusal to criminally sanction M.H. Their constitutional complaint was declared inadmissible by the Constitutional Court on 21 December 2020, which held that the decision complained of was not amenable to constitutional review. 8.     Before the Court, the applicants complained, under Articles 8 and 13 of the Convention, that they had been subjected to online public hate speech, which formed an attack on their human dignity, reputation and private life, and that they had no effective means of protection. They further complained, under Article 14 of the Convention, that they were discriminated against on the basis of their mother’s political opinion. THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT 9.     The Court does not consider it necessary to decide on each and every inadmissibility objection raised by the Government, because the present case is in any event inadmissible for the following reasons. 10.     The general principles related to the balancing between the right to freedom of expression and the right to respect for private life have been summarised in   Minasyan and Others v. Armenia (no. 59180/15, §§ 58-61, 7   January 2025). Moreover, the Court has previously held that where acts that constitute serious offences are directed against a person’s physical or mental integrity, only efficient criminal-law mechanisms can ensure adequate protection and serve as a deterrent factor (see, among other authorities, Beizaras and Levickas v. Lithuania , no. 41288/15, § 111, 14   January 2020, and the cases cited therein). It has likewise accepted that criminal-law measures were required with respect to direct verbal assaults and physical threats motivated by discriminatory attitudes (ibid.). As far as acts encroaching on an individual’s psychological integrity are concerned, the obligation to maintain and apply in practice an adequate legal framework does not always require that a criminal ‑ law provision covering the specific act be put in place. The legal framework could also be made up of administrative or civil-law remedies capable of affording sufficient protection, possibly combined with procedural remedies such as the granting of an injunction (see,   mutatis mutandis , Söderman v. Sweden [GC], no.   5786/08, §§ 85 and 108, ECHR 2013;   Király and Dömötör v. Hungary , no.   10851/13, § 61, 17 January 2017; and, more recently,   Nepomnyashchiy and Others v. Russi a , nos. 39954/09 and 3465/17, § 76, 30 May 2023). The choice of the means calculated to secure compliance with Article 8 of the Convention in the sphere of the relations of individuals between themselves is in principle a matter that falls within the Contracting States’ margin of appreciation. There are different ways of ensuring respect for private life and the nature of the State’s obligation will depend on the particular aspect of private life that is in issue (see , Söderman , § 79, and Nepomnyashchiy and Others , § 76, both cited above). 11.     Turning to the present case, the Court notes that the impugned statement of M.H. was not directed towards the applicants, but towards their mother, as criticism for her damaging a cultural heritage building. It did not constitute a direct verbal assault on the applicants, or any sort of call for violence or intolerance towards them on discriminatory motives. Consequently, the Court considers that the impugned comment, although involving children, did not amount to hate speech or incitement to violence (compare Pihl v. Sweden (dec.), no. 74742/14, § 25, 7 February 2017, and contrast   Delfi AS v. Estoni a [GC], no. 64569/09, §§ 18, 114 and 162, ECHR   2015). 12.     That being said, the Court considers that the impugned comment did not require a criminal-law sanction. It can thus not criticise the domestic authorities for dismissing the applicants’ criminal complaint for the reasons they did (see paragraph 5 above) or conclude that in doing so the State had failed to fulfil its positive obligation in protecting the applicants’ private life. 13.     At the same time, as submitted by the Government, the applicants had at their disposal a civil-law remedy if they considered that their personality rights, including privacy, dignity and reputation, had been damaged by M.H.’s comment. In that way, they would have given the domestic authorities the possibility to review all the circumstances of the case and to balance the applicants’ right to respect for private life with M.H.’s right to freedom of expression. What is more, for any discrimination complaint, the applicants could have brought an action pursuant to the provisions of the Prevention of Discrimination Act (see Đorđević v. Croatia , no. 41526/10, § 162, ECHR   2012).   However, the applicants never instituted either of those proceedings. 14.     Accordingly, the Government’s objection as to the admissibility must be upheld and this complaint must be rejected for non-exhaustion of domestic remedies under Article   35 §§   1 and 4 of the Convention. For these reasons, the Court, unanimously, Declares the application inadmissible. Done in English and notified in writing on 2 October 2025.     Liv Tigerstedt   Erik Wennerström   Deputy Registrar   President