CEDH · PRESS;GCREFERRALS;ENG — 9 février 2009

.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 } .s6B505E72 { margin:0pt; padding-left:0pt } .s1C7BEF1E { margin-left:28.52pt; padding-left:7.48pt; font-family:serif } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s653E6C45 { font-family:Arial; font-size:6.67pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } .s3DC36BA9 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline; color:#0069d6 } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sC7EAD8B { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; text-decoration:underline } .sF6A12959 { width:33%; height:1px; text-align:left } .s2EB42ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:10pt } EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS   94 9.2.2009   Press release issued by the Registrar   CASES ACCEPTED FOR REFERRAL TO THE GRAND CHAMBER   The following cases have been referred to the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights:   Guiso-Gallisay v. Italy (application no. 58858/00)   ; Kononov v. Latvia (no. 36376/04).   At its last meeting, the Grand Chamber panel of five judges accepted the above cases for referral to the Grand Chamber, under Article 43 [1] of the European Convention on Human Rights.   Judgments in a further 28 cases, listed at the end of the press release, are now final [2] after requests for them to be referred to the Grand Chamber were rejected.   The text of the Chamber judgments and corresponding press releases are available on the Court’s Internet site: http://www.echr.coe.int .     1. Cases accepted by the Grand Chamber   Guiso-Gallisay v. Italy The applicants are three Italian nationals, Stefano Guiso-Gallisay, Gian Francesco Guiso-Gallisay and Antonella Guiso-Gallisay.   They were formerly the owners of land which was occupied by the administrative authorities with a view to its expropriation and on which those authorities commenced construction work. In the absence of any formal expropriation accompanied by compensation, the applicants brought proceedings seeking damages for the unlawful occupation of their land.   The applicants alleged that the occupation of their land had infringed their right to the peaceful enjoyment of their possessions, guaranteed by Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (protection of property).   In a judgment of 8   December 2005, the Court held that the interference with the applicants’ right to the peaceful enjoyment of their possessions through the indirect expropriation of their land was incompatible with the principle of legality and that there had accordingly been a violation of Article   1 of Protocol No.   1 (protection of property). It also held that the question of the application of Article   41 (just satisfaction) was not ready for decision.   In the judgment of 21 October 2008, the Court varied its case-law on application of Article   41 in the case of indirect expropriation. The method used hitherto was to compensate for losses that would not be covered by payment of a sum obtained by adding the market value of the property to the cost of not deriving earnings from the property, by automatically assessing those losses as the gross value of the works carried out by the State plus the value of the land in today’s prices. However, the Court considered that this method of compensation was not justified and could lead to unequal treatment between applicants, depending on the nature of the public works carried out by the public authorities, which was not necessarily linked to the potential of the land in its original state. In order to assess the loss sustained by the applicants, it therefore decided that the date on which they had established with legal certainty that they had lost the right of ownership over the property concerned should be taken into consideration. The total market value of the property fixed on that date by the national courts was then to be adjusted for inflation and increased by the amount of interest due on the date of the judgment’s adoption by the Court. The sum paid to applicants by the authorities of the country concerned was to be deducted from the resulting amount. In the present case, the sum to be awarded for pecuniary damage amounted to   1,803,374   euros   (EUR) for the three applicants jointly. The Court also awarded them EUR   45,000 for non-pecuniary damage and EUR   30,000   for costs and expenses.   On 26 January the case was referred to the Grand Chamber at the applicants’ request.     Kononov v. Latvia Vasiliy Kononov was born in 1923. He was a Latvian national until 12 April 2000, when he was granted Russian nationality.   The case concerned Mr Kononov’s prosecution for war crimes he allegedly committed in 1944. At the time the territory of Latvia was under German occupation.   In 1942 the applicant was called up as a soldier in the Soviet Army. In 1943 he was parachuted into Belarus territory (also under German occupation at the time) near the Latvian border, where he joined a Soviet commando unit composed of members of the “Red Partisans”.   According to the facts as definitively established by the competent Latvian courts, on 27 May 1944 the applicant led a unit of armed Red Partisans wearing German uniforms to avoid arousing suspicion in a punitive expedition on the village of Mazie Bati, certain of whose inhabitants were suspected of having betrayed and turned into the Germans another group of Red Partisans. The applicant’s men burst into and searched six houses. After finding rifles and grenades supplied by the German military administration in each of the houses, the Partisans executed the six heads of family concerned. They also wounded two women. They then set fire to two houses and four people perished in the flames. In all, nine villagers were killed: six men and three women, one in the final stages of pregnancy.   According to the applicant, the victims of the attack were collaborators who had delivered a group of 12 Partisans (including two women and a small child) into the hands of the Germans some three months earlier. The applicant said that his unit had been instructed to capture those responsible so that they could be brought to trial. He had not personally led the operation or entered the village.   In January 1998 the Centre for the Documentation of the Consequences of Totalitarianism ( Totalitārisma seku dokumentēšanas centrs ) launched a criminal investigation into the events of 27 May 1944. It considered that the applicant could have committed war crimes under Article 68-3 of the former Latvian Criminal Code. Article 68-3 stipulated that those found guilty of war crimes were liable to between three and fifteen years’ imprisonment or life imprisonment. Article 6-1 permitted the retrospective application of the criminal law with respect to war crimes and Article 45-1 provided that the prosecution of such crimes was not subject to statutory limitation.   On 2 August 1998 the applicant was charged with war crimes and on 10 October 1998 placed in pre-trial detention. He entered a not guilty plea.   The Riga Regional Court found him guilty and imposed an immediate six-year custodial sentence.   That judgment was quashed, however, on 25 April 2000 on the ground that various issues remained unresolved, including whether Mazie Bati had in fact been within “occupied territory” and whether the applicant and his victims could be classified as “combatants” and “non-combatants” respectively. The applicant was released from detention.   On 17 May 2001, following a fresh preliminary investigation, the applicant was again charged with an offence under Article   68-3.   On 3 October 2003 the Latgale Regional Court acquitted him of the war-crimes charges, but found him guilty of banditry. It accepted that the deaths of the men from Mazie Bati could be regarded as necessary and justified in military terms, but found that there was no justification for the killing of the three women or the burning down of the village buildings. The applicant and his men had committed an act of banditry and the applicant, as the commanding officer, was responsible for the actions of his unit. However, since banditry did not fall into the category of offences exempt from statutory limitation, the Regional Court relieved the applicant of criminal liability.   On 30 April 2004, the Criminal Affairs Division of the Supreme Court allowed an appeal from the prosecution and quashed that judgment, again finding the applicant guilty of war crimes under Article 68-3. Noting that he was aged, infirm and harmless, it imposed an immediate custodial sentence of one year and eight months. The applicant lodged an unsuccessful appeal on points of law.   The applicant complained under Article 7 § 1 that the acts of which he had been accused did not, at the time of their commission, constitute an offence under either domestic or international law.   In a judgment of 24   July 2008, the Court held, by four votes to three, that there had been a violation of Article 7 (no punishment without law) of the European Convention on Human Rights. Under Article 41 (just satisfaction) of the Convention, the Court awarded the applicant, by four votes to three, EUR   30,000 in respect of non-pecuniary damage.   On 26 January 2009 the case was referred to the Grand Chamber at the Government’s request.     2. Cases rejected by the Grand Chamber   Vidal Escoll and Guillán González v. Andorra (no. 38196/05), judgment of 29 July 2008.   Družstevní Záložna Pria and Others v. Czech Republic (no. 72034/01), judgment of 31 July 2008.   Chelmi v. Greece (no. 48701/06), judgment of 31 July 2008.   Mezey v. Hungary (no. 7909/05), judgment of 14 October 2008.   Scoppola v. Italy (no. 50550/06), judgment of 10 June 2008.   Backes v. Luxembourg (no. 24261/05), judgment of 8 July 2008.   Czuwara v. Poland (no. 36250/06), judgment of 29 July 2008.   Bercaru v. Romania (no. 8870/02), judgment of 16 September 2008. Crăciun v. Romania (no. 5512/02), judgment of 30 September 2008. Duţă v. Romania (no. 29558/02), judgment of 30 September 2008. Gheorghe and Maria Mihaela Dumitrescu v. Romania (no. 6373/03), judgment of 29 July 2008. Maria Peter and Others v. Romania (no. 54369/00), judgment of 16 September 2008.   Antonova v. Russia (no. 25749/05), judgment of 25 September 2008. Filonenko v. Russia (no. 22094/04), judgment of 31 July 2008. Galich v. Russia (no. 33307/02), judgment of 13 May 2008. Glukhova and Bragina v. Russia (no. 28785/04), judgment of 18 September 2008. Nadrosov v. Russia (no. 9297/02), judgment of 31 July 2008. Protsenko v. Russia (no. 13151/04), judgment of 31 July 2008. Polufakin and Chernyshev v. Russia (no. 30997/02), judgment of 25 September 2008. Takhayeva and Others v. Russia (no. 23286/04), judgment of 18 September 2008. Vladimir Romanov v. Russia (no. 41461/02), judgment of 24 July 2008. Zakharov v. Russia (no. 35932/04), judgment of 2 October 2008.   Çirak and Others v. Turkey (no. 33433/02), judgment of 22 July 2008. Foka v. Turkey (no. 28940/95), judgment of 24 June 2008. Köktepe v. Turkey (no. 35785/03), judgment of 22 July 2008. Sari and Others v. Turkey (no. 13767/04), judgment of 29 July 2008. Turgut and Others v. Turkey (no. 1411/03), judgment of 8 July 2008.   Leontyuk v. Ukraine (no. 3687/05), judgment of 22 July 2008.     ****   Press contacts Stefano Piedimonte (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 90 21 42 04) Tracey Turner-Tretz (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 88 41 35 30) Paramy Chanthalangsy (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 88 41 28 30) Kristina Pencheva-Malinowski (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 88 41 35 70) Céline Menu-Lange (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 90 21 58 77)   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] Under Article 44 § 2 (c) of the European Convention on Human Rights, the judgment of a Chamber shall become final when the panel of the Grand Chamber rejects the request to refer under Article 43.