CEDH · PRESS;CHAMBERJUDGMENTS;ENG — 7 février 2006

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .sFE10DC93 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s40F41F73 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:right } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s653E6C45 { font-family:Arial; font-size:6.67pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .s9F8EB0C0 { width:18.63pt; display:inline-block } .s9E97F54A { width:85.05pt; display:inline-block } .sF6A12959 { width:33%; height:1px; text-align:left } .s2EB42ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:10pt } EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS   64 7.2.2006   Press release issued by the Registrar   CHAMBER JUDGMENT D.H. AND OTHERS v. THE CZECH REPUBLIC   The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing its Chamber judgment [1] in the case of D.H. and Others v. the Czech Republic (application no. 57325/00).   The Court held, by six votes to one, that there had been no violation of Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) of the European Convention on Human Rights, taken in conjunction with Article 2 of Protocol No. 1 (right to education). (The judgment is available in French and English.)   1.     Principal facts   The applicants are 18 Czech nationals of Roma origin who were born between 1985 and 1991 and live in the Ostrava region (Czech Republic).   Between 1996 and 1999 they were placed in special schools (zvláštní   školy) for children with learning difficulties unable to follow the ordinary school curriculum. By law, the decision to place a child in a special school is taken by the head teacher on the basis of the results of tests to measure the child’s intellectual capacity carried out in an educational psychology and child guidance centre, and requires the consent of the child’s legal representative.   Fourteen of the applicants sought a review by the Ostrava Education Department ( školský úřad ) on the grounds that the tests performed had been unreliable and that their parents had not been sufficiently informed of the consequences of giving consent. The Education Department found that the placements had been made in accordance with the statutory rules.   In addition, 12 of the applicants appealed to the Constitutional Court. They argued that their placement in special schools amounted to a general practice that created segregation and racial discrimination through the coexistence of two autonomous educational systems, namely special schools for the Roma and “normal” primary schools for the majority of the population. That appeal was dismissed on 20 October 1999.       2.     Procedure and composition of the Court   The application was lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 18 April 2000. On 10 May 2004 the President of the Chamber granted leave to the non ‑ governmental organisations Interights and Human Rights Watch to submit written observations as third ‑ party interveners. The application was declared partly admissible following a public hearing held in the Human Rights Building, Strasbourg, on 1 March 2005.   Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:   Jean-Paul Costa (French), President , András Baka (Hungarian), Ireneu Cabral Barreto (Portuguese), Karel Jungwiert (Czech), Volodymyr Butkevych (Ukrainian), Antonella Mularoni (San Marinese), Danutė Jočienė (Lithuanian),   judges ,   and also Sally Dollé , Section Registrar .   3.     Summary of the judgment [2]   Complaint   The applicants complained under Article   2 of Protocol No. 1, taken alone and together with Article 14, that they had suffered discrimination in the enjoyment of their right to education on account of their Roma origin.   Decision of the Court   The Court observed that several organisations, including Council of Europe bodies, had expressed concern about the arrangements whereby Roma children living in the Czech Republic were placed in special schools and about the difficulties they had in gaining access to ordinary schools. However, it was not for the Court to assess the overall social context; its role was to determine whether the reason for the applicants’ placement in the special schools had been their ethnic or racial origin.   The Court reiterated that the setting and planning of the curriculum fell in principle within the competence of the State concerned. That mainly involved questions of expediency on which it was not for the Court to rule and whose solution might legitimately vary according to the country and the era. Given States’ margin of appreciation in the education sphere, they could not be prohibited from setting up different types of school for children with difficulties or implementing special educational programmes to respond to special needs.   In the applicants’ case, the Court observed that the rules governing children’s placement in special schools did not refer to the pupils’ ethnic origin, but pursued the legitimate aim of adapting the education system to the needs and aptitudes or disabilities of the children. Since those were not legal concepts, it was only right that experts in educational psychology should be responsible for identifying them. Moreover, the applicants’ representatives had not succeeded in refuting the experts’ findings concerning the applicants’ learning disabilities.   It also needed to be borne in mind that, in their capacity as the applicants’ lawful representatives, the applicants’ parents had failed to take any action, despite having received a clear written decision informing them of their children’s placement in a special school; indeed, in some instances it had been the parents who had asked for their children to be placed or to remain in a special school.   Furthermore, the fact that some of the applicants had subsequently been transferred to ordinary schools proved that, contrary to what had been alleged by the applicants, the situation was not irreversible.   As to the applicants’ argument that the parental consent had not been “informed” and, in some cases, had been pre-dated, the Court noted that it was the parents’ responsibility, as part of their natural duty to ensure that their children received an education, to find out about the educational opportunities offered by the State, to make sure they knew the date on which they had given their consent to their children’s placement in a particular school and, if necessary, to make an appropriate challenge to the decision ordering the placement if it had been issued without their consent.   Thus, while acknowledging that the statistics disclosed figures that were worrying and that the overall situation in the Czech Republic concerning the education of Roma children was by no means perfect, the Court could not in the circumstances find that the measures taken against the applicants had been discriminatory. Although the applicants might have lacked information about the national education system or found themselves in a climate of mistrust, the concrete evidence before the Court in the applicants’ case did not enable it to conclude that the applicants’ placement or, in some instances, continued placement, in special schools had been the result of racial prejudice.   Accordingly, the Court held that there had been no violation of Article 14 taken in conjunction with Article 2 of Protocol No. 1.     Judge Costa expressed a concurring opinion and Judge Cabral Barreto expressed a dissenting opinion, which are annexed to the judgment.   ***   The Court’s judgments are accessible on its Internet site ( http://www.echr.coe.int ).   Registry of the European Court of Human Rights F – 67075 Strasbourg Cedex Press contacts:   Roderick Liddell (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 88 41 24 92)   Emma Hellyer (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 90 21 42 15)   Stéphanie Klein (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 88 41 21 54)   Beverley Jacobs (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 90 21 54 21) Fax: +00 33 (0)3 88 41 27 91   The European Court of Human Rights was set up in Strasbourg by the Council of Europe Member States in 1959 to deal with alleged violations of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights. Since 1 November 1998 it has sat as a full-time Court composed of an equal number of judges to that of the States party to the Convention. The Court examines the admissibility and merits of applications submitted to it. It sits in Chambers of 7 judges or, in exceptional cases, as a Grand Chamber of 17 judges. The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe supervises the execution of the Court’s judgments. More detailed information about the Court and its activities can be found on its Internet site. [1] Under Article 43 of the European Convention on Human Rights, within three months from the date of a Chamber judgment, any party to the case may, in exceptional cases, request that the case be referred to the 17 ‑ member Grand Chamber of the Court. In that event, a panel of five judges considers whether the case raises a serious question affecting the interpretation or application of the Convention or its protocols, or a serious issue of general importance, in which case the Grand Chamber will deliver a final judgment. If no such question or issue arises, the panel will reject the request, at which point the judgment becomes final. Otherwise Chamber judgments become final on the expiry of the three-month period or earlier if the parties declare that they do not intend to make a request to refer. [2] This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.