CEDH · PRESS;GENERAL;ENG — 18 juillet 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 } .s33165EBA { font-family:Arial; font-size:8pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .s6B505E72 { margin:0pt; padding-left:0pt } .sD711EC90 { margin-left:31.52pt; padding-left:7.48pt; font-family:serif } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .s76CF415B { page-break-before:always; clear:both } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .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 } .s653E6C45 { font-family:Arial; font-size:6.67pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS   433 18.7.2006   Press release issued by the Registrar   CHAMBER JUDGMENT ŠTEFANEC v. THE CZECH REPUBLIC   The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing its Chamber judgment [1] in the case of Štefanec v. the Czech Republic (application no. 75615/01).   The Court held unanimously that there had been a violation of Article 6 § 1 (right to a fair trial) of the European Convention on Human Rights; that there had been a violation of Article 10 (freedom of expression) of the Convention.   The Court considered that the finding of a violation in itself constituted sufficient just satisfaction for the non-pecuniary damage suffered by the applicant. Under Article 41 (just satisfaction) of the Convention, it awarded him 34 euros (EUR) for pecuniary damage and EUR 1,012 for costs and expenses. (The judgment is available only in French.)   1.     Principal facts   The applicant, Milan Štefanec, is a Czech national who was born in 1973 and lives in Brno (Czech Republic).   On 22 May 2000 a certain D.Š. informed Brno City Council of his intention to organise a peaceful protest march on 27 May to highlight the negative impact of road traffic on the environment and the health of the city’s population. The City Council banned the march, citing the danger for the health of the participants and the fact that the necessary restrictions on traffic and goods deliveries would be contrary to the public interest. An appeal was lodged against that decision, which was upheld by the Regional Court on the day following the date on which the march took place, that is, on 28 May 2000.   In spite of the ban, the march took place as planned on 27 May 2000. At the demonstration the applicant used a megaphone to communicate with the police, pass on the appeals of the authorities to forestall any acts of violence and inform the demonstrators that the march had been banned and that an appeal against that decision was pending.   On 7 September 2000 the Central Brno District Committee responsible for investigating summary offences imposed on Mr Štefanec a fine of approximately EUR 17.50 pursuant to the Right of Assembly Act (Law no. 84/1990) for having organised a demonstration which had been banned. Two other persons were accused of the same offence, but their sentences were quashed on appeal for lack of evidence, whereas the applicant’s fine was upheld.   On 25   April 2001 the Constitutional Court dismissed an appeal by the applicant as being manifestly ill-founded. It endorsed the findings of the administrative authorities and held that the necessary restrictions imposed on the applicant were the result of the fact that he had organised a prohibited assembly.   2.     Procedure and composition of the Court   The application was lodged on 29 October 2001 and declared partly admissible on 25 August 2005.   Judgment was given by a Chamber of 7 judges, composed as follows:   Jean-Paul Costa (French), President , András Baka (Hungarian), Riza Türmen (Turkish), Karel Jungwiert (Czech), Mindia Ugrekhelidze (Georgian), Danutė Jočienė (Lithuanian), Dragoljub Popović (Serbian), judges , and also Sally Dollé , Section Registrar .   3.     Summary of the judgment [2]   Complaints   The applicant complained of the impossibility of submitting to an independent tribunal the decisions taken by the administrative authorities. He further complained of the fact that an administrative penalty had been imposed on him. He relied on Articles 6 § 1 and 10 of the Convention.   Decision of the Court   Article 6 § 1   The Court reiterated that, while it was not incompatible with the Convention to give administrative authorities the task of prosecuting and punishing summary offences, the person accused must be able to submit any decision thus taken against him to subsequent review by a tribunal affording the safeguards of Article 6. The procedure in the Czech Constitutional Court was limited to consideration of questions of constitutionality and did not involve a full, direct assessment of appellants’ civil rights.   That being so, the Court considered that in the present case there had not been a judicial review of sufficient scope for the purposes of Article 6 § 1 and that the applicant had therefore been deprived of the right of access to a “tribunal” within the meaning of that provision. It accordingly held that there had been a violation of Article 6 § 1. Article 10   The Court noted that in finding that the applicant had organised the march in question the authorities had referred in particular to what he had said during the march and the feelings his remarks had aroused among the participants. The administrative fine imposed on the applicant had therefore amounted to an interference with his right to freedom of expression, which interference was prescribed by the Right of Assembly Act (Law no. 84/1990).   The question which the Court had to answer in the present case was whether Czech legislation indicated with sufficient precision the conditions in which it was possible to consider a person to be the organiser of an assembly and to impose a penalty on him when that assembly had been prohibited.   The features which, for the purposes of Law no. 84/1990, served to define the term “organiser of an assembly” included receiving instructions from the convener, who was required to designate him in such a way as to distinguish him from the crowd. In the present case the conduct held against the applicant was that he had acted as a “ voluntary intermediary ” and had used his technical equipment to announce to the participants in bitter tones that the authorities had arbitrarily banned the march, not to ask them to disperse. It was therefore essentially because of the content of his remarks, not because he had “organised or managed” the march, that the applicant had been held to be its organiser and fined accordingly. In the Court’s view, the way the administrative authorities had interpreted Czech law in punishing the applicant, an interpretation subsequently confirmed by the Constitutional Court, constituted an extension of the scope of Law no. 84/1990 which it had been impossible, within reason, to foresee.   Moreover, where the failure to discharge an obligation was punishable, legislation should clearly define the cases in which punishment was to be imposed, and that did not appear to be the case, judging by the differences in the ways the applicant and the two persons who were prosecuted at the same time as him had been treated.   The Court therefore considered that section 14(1) of the Right of Assembly Act (Law no.   84/1990) did not satisfy the requirements of foreseeability in the way it had been applied in the present case. There had accordingly been a violation of Article 10.   ***   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:   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)   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. [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.