Human Rights

ECtHR Sets Standards on Right to Remain Silent

July 17, 2019

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has held French police officers violated a criminal suspect’s right to a fair trial by not informing him of his right to remain silent and by restricting his access to an attorney following his arrest.
ECtHR: Belgium Failed to Properly Review Spanish Arrest Warrant

July 17, 2019

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has held that Belgian courts failed to properly scrutinize the risks of a human rights violation in deciding to reject a European arrest warrant from Spain seeking the surrender of a murder suspect.
ECJ Permits Lithuania to Make TV Station Pay-per-View

July 17, 2019

The Court of Justice of the EU (ECJ) has upheld a decision by Lithuanian authorities to require broadcasters to charge customers a fee to watch a Russian-language television station due to that station’s broadcast of material that constitutes “incitement to hostility to and hatred of the Baltic States on grounds of nationality.”
ECtHR: Drunk-Driving Test with Catheter Violated Rights

July 02, 2019

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has held that Hungarian police officers’ use of a catheter to extract and test urine of a man suspected of driving while intoxicated - arguably without his consent and after the officers had taken his blood sample - violated the man’s right against inhuman or degrading treatment.
ECtHR: Continuous Surveillance Violated Russian Prisoners’ Rights

July 02, 2019

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has held that permanent video surveillance by Russian prisons of various prisoners in their cells without any procedural limits on prison authorities violated the prisoners’ right to “respect for private life.”
CoE Readmittance of Russia Splits Rights Activists

June 27, 2019

Deutsche Welle reports on the debate among human rights activists over the merits of the decision to restore Russian voting rights at the Council of Europe (CoE), with supporters hailing the move as a way to continue holding Russia accountable for rights violations and critics pointing to the CoE’s lack of influence over the Kremlin.
Observers Fault CoE Body for Concession to Russia

June 26, 2019

Aaron Rhodes and Willy Fautré write that the decision of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (CoE) to readmit Russia in spite of the failure of the Russian government to withdraw from Ukrainian territory sacrifices human rights “on the altar of a geopolitical agenda.”
ECtHR: Bosnia’s Detention of Syrian Man Violated Rights

June 25, 2019

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has held that Bosnia and Herzegovina had violated the right to liberty and security of a Syrian national it held in detention and attempted to deport for several years because it must have been clear to authorities that no safe country would admit the man, who was classified as a national security risk.
UK Official Seeks EU-Wide Approach to Post-Brexit Citizens’ Rights

June 19, 2019

The Guardian reports that the UK’s Brexit Secretary Stephen Barclay has urged the European Commission’s chief Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier to rethink his refusal to “ring-fence” citizens’ rights from the remainder of the UK-EU withdrawal deal to ensure their protection in the event the UK leaves the bloc without an agreement.
EU Bodies Introduce Minimum Workers’ Rights

June 19, 2019

The EU institutions have agreed a set of “minimum rights” for workers across the bloc, imposing new requirements on employers, especially those operating in the budding gig economy, to inform workers of their working conditions and introducing new labor rights such as the right to take a second job.