CEDH · PRESS;GENERAL;ENG — 23 juillet 2002

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .sFE10DC93 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .s94935B0F { width:389.85pt; display:inline-block } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s33165EBA { font-family:Arial; font-size:8pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } .sE8B7DB97 { width:177.49pt; display:inline-block } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .s83BE5C30 { font-family:Arial; font-size:8pt; vertical-align:super } .s30F0174A { width:50.16pt; display:inline-block } .sADADF4A7 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sCB27B9E { width:16.66pt; display:inline-block } .s23A41E03 { width:36pt; display:inline-block } .sF6A12959 { width:33%; height:1px; text-align:left } .s2EB42ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:10pt } .s3133A7C8 { font-family:Arial; color:#0069d6 } EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS     387   23.7.2002   Press release issued by the Registrar   CHAMBER JUDGMENTS CONCERNING Germany and Turkey   The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing the following two Chamber judgments, of which only Taskin v. Germany is final. [1]   Section 3   (1)     Taskin v. Germany (no. 56132/00)   Striking out Fatma Taskin is a Turkish national who was born in 1971 and lives in Völklingen (Germany).   Having entered Germany with a tourist visa on 14 August 1988, she applied for a residence permit ( Aufenthaltserlaubnis ) on 11 October 1988 under the arrangements governing family reunion, in order to live with her husband, Niyati Taskin. Her husband, also a Turkish national, had a permanent residence permit ( unbefristete Aufenthaltserlaubnis ) and had been living in Germany since 1981.   On the basis of documents certifying her husband’s income, the chairman of the Saarbrücken metropolitan district council ( Stadtverband ) granted the applicant a temporary residence permit ( befristete Aufenthaltserlaubnis ), which was renewed several times. The applicant had two children, Murat and Yasmine, in 1989 and 1995; both were born in Germany and are Turkish nationals.   On 18 August 1999 the chairman of the Saarbrücken metropolitan district council refused to renew the applicant’s residence permit, pursuant to the Aliens Act ( Ausländergesetz ), and ordered her expulsion. The grounds for the refusal were that her husband had been unemployed since 1998 and was unable or unwilling to return to gainful employment and that she herself had never learnt German, a fact that indicated their reluctance to integrate.   A number of summary applications by the applicant for a stay of execution of the expulsion order were dismissed. She also lodged an objection ( Widerspruch ) to the decision not to renew her residence permit, but to no avail. On 14 February 2002 she reached a partial friendly settlement with the Saarbrücken metropolitan district council in the Saarland Administrative Court ( Verwaltungsgericht ) whereby she was granted a special residence permit on humanitarian grounds ( Aufenthaltsbefugnis ). However, the court refused her application for an ordinary residence permit ( Aufenthaltserlaubnis ). She appealed against that decision on 10 June 2002.   Mrs Taskin now lives under supervision in a convalescent home. She is separated from her husband, who, according to the Government, no longer lives in Germany. It also appears that her children have left Germany to live with their grandmother in Turkey.   The applicant submitted to the Court that the German authorities’ decision not to renew her residence permit and to order her expulsion infringed her right to respect for her family life, as guaranteed by Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.   The Court noted that the German authorities had undertaken to grant Mrs Taskin a special residence permit on humanitarian grounds, thereby removing the threat of her being expelled to Turkey. It observed that the purpose of her application had been above all to prevent her expulsion to Turkey so that she would not be separated from her family. However, she currently lived apart from her husband and children for reasons that were not attributable to Germany. The Court considered that, even if the applicant’s health permitted her to return to Turkey, there would be nothing to prevent her from living there with her children, who had, moreover, been resident in Turkey since May 2000.   The Court accordingly considered that it was no longer justified to continue the examination of the application and unanimously decided to strike the case out of the list. (The judgment is in French only.)   (2)     Denli v. Turkey (no. 68117/01)   Violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 Nesibe Denli is a Turkish national who was born in 1915 and lives İzmir.   She owned land in İzmir which was expropriated by the Major-Roads Department in 1991 (Karayolları Genel Müdürlüğü). She complained to the İzmir High Court about the amount of compensation she had received and it awarded her an additional sum of 340,643,582 Turkish liras (TRL). The compensation was paid on 23 January 1998, that is to say approximately fourteen months after the final judicial decision; with accrued interest the amount came to TRL 997,945,000.   Relying on Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (protection of property), the applicant complained that, owing to the high rate of inflation in Turkey, the authorities’ delay in paying the additional compensation had infringed her right to the peaceful enjoyment of her possessions. She also alleged a violation of Article 14 (prohibition on discrimination).   The Court noted that there were no grounds for declaring the application inadmissible and consequently declared it admissible.   It pointed out that unusually lengthy delays in the payment of compensation for expropriation could result in a greater financial loss for the person whose property had been expropriated. It noted that the additional compensation awarded to the applicant bore default interest at the rate of 30% per annum, whereas at the material time, inflation in Turkey had been running at an average of 70% and the default interest rate applicable to debts owed to the State was 84% per annum.   It considered that the delay in the payment of the compensation was attributable to the authorities and had resulted in the applicant having to bear an individual and excessive burden.   The Court consequently held unanimously that there had been a violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 and that it was unnecessary to examine the complaint under Article 14. It awarded the applicant EUR 2,500 for pecuniary damage, EUR 1,100 for non-pecuniary damage and EUR 600 for costs and expenses. (The judgment is in French only.)   ***   These summaries by the Registry do not bind the Court. The full texts of 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 Contacts:   Roderick Liddell (telephone: (0)3 88 41 24 92)   Emma Hellyer (telephone: (0)3 90 21 42 15) Fax: (0)3 88 41 27 91   The European Court of Human Rights was set up in Strasbourg in 1959 to deal with alleged violations of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights. On 1 November 1998 a full-time Court was established, replacing the original two-tier system of a part-time Commission and Court. [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.