Extraordinary Remedies and Constitutional Complaint in Serbian Civil Procedure as an admissibility condition for ECtHr applications

The institute of constitutional complaint is quite common in many European countries, but in Ukraine it appeared only in 2017. The introduction of such a remedy is due to the need to protect human rights, on the one hand, and the preventive role of the constitutional review body in relation to a significant number of complaints to the European Court of Human Rights against Ukraine - on the other. However, the “effectiveness” of such an institution in both planes is quite relative and depends on many elements. Today, the constitutional complaint implemented in Ukraine is only the beginning of a mechanism of constitutional control over violated human rights and does not play the role of an “effective” remedy at both national and international levels. This article defines the institution of a constitutional complaint as an effective remedy in the doctrine and practice of the European Court of Human Rights, as in some cases and in certain countries the Court considers a constitutional complaint an “effective” remedy within the meaning of Article 13 of the Convention on Human Rights. fundamental freedoms, but not in others. Therefore, it is important to define the criteria of “effectiveness” of an individual constitutional appeal, as well as the applicability of such criteria to the existing in Ukraine constitutional mechanism for reviewing cases on constitutional complaints. Given the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, as well as statistics and polls, the criteria for considering a constitutional complaint as an effective remedy in the European Court of Human Rights are quite different from those established in Ukraine. In addition, the “effectiveness” of the constitutional complaint is also affected by domestic political processes, which reflect the public’s trust in certain legal remedies and in certain state bodies as a whole.

The activity of the European Court of Human Rights is investigated and the significance of the relevant practice of the European Court for the judicial practice of Ukraine is determined. It is emphasized, that a constitutional complaint serves as an effective means of protecting fundamental human rights, strengthening the rule of law and building democracy, which has already been tested in many countries around the world. The article notes that the institution of constitutional complaint significantly expands the possibilities of protecting citizens. In general, this institution is a kind of constitutional appeal, which should be understood as a written petition, submitted to the Court to review the constitutionality of the law of Ukraine (its constitutional provisions), which is used in the final court decision in the case of the subject of a constitutional rights complaint. The author also draws attention to the issues of advantages and disadvantages of a constitutional complaint and a constitutional appeal separately. Thus, one of the advantages of having a constitutional complaint is that the grounds for filing a constitutional complaint are a violation of fundamental human and civil rights. The advantages also include the fact that, unlike a constitutional appeal, which is a mechanism solely for interpreting a certain provision of the law, which excludes the possibility for individuals to apply to a constitutional justice body to declare regulations unconstitutional, a complaint directly provides such a right. However, at the same time, the model of the constitutional complaint, introduced in Ukraine on the subject, is an incomplete normative constitutional complaint, which is related to the consideration of a specific case. After all, according to it, only one type of normative legal act is subject to appeal, a law, and only the one that was applied during the trial of the person. It is stated, that ensuring the possibility of a person to take an active part in the control over the activities of higher state authorities, which is implemented in the relevant legal forms, provides grounds for recognizing a constitutional complaint as one of the modern institutions of democracy. In fact, a constitutional complaint is an effective procedural means to protect the fundamental rights and freedoms of citizens

This article examines the influence of the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights on the development of the civil procedural law of Ukraine and the practice of applying its norms by domestic courts. The concept and essence of the precedent nature of decisions (decisions) of the European Court of Human Rights, their place in the system of so-called "judicial sources" of civil procedural law are defined. The shortcomings of the Law of Ukraine "On the implementation of decisions and application of the practice of the European Court of Human Rights" are indicated, which recognizes the practice of the European Court of Human Rights as a source of law and the position of domestic courts regarding this deficiency.
 It is noted that the source of law according to the Law of Ukraine "On the Execution of Decisions and Application of the Practice of the European Court of Human Rights" is also the practice of the European Commission on Human Rights and its role in the procedure for considering complaints about violations of the Convention is determined.
 The directions of the influence of the practice of the European Court of Human Rights on civil proceedings are outlined, where it is concluded that a precedent can be formed on any procedural issue due to the dynamic interpretation by the specified court of the provisions of the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of 1950 and its protocols . It is noted that the practice of the European Court of Human Rights generally constructs legal ideas regarding the principles of civil procedure and the right to a fair trial. On the example of a separate decision of the European Court of Human Rights, the law enforcement and regulatory influence on the results of consideration and resolution of a civil case and the development of the civil procedural law of Ukraine, respectively, are analyzed. The importance of the practice of the European Court of Human Rights for the civil justice of Ukraine is summarized. In particular, taking into account the precedent practice of the ECtHR during the consideration and resolution of civil cases will eliminate the factors that serve as the reason for the appeal to the Court and will introduce European standards of protection of human rights and freedoms into Ukrainian civil proceedings. As a result, the impact of the decisions of the ECtHR will reduce the need to appeal to an international judicial institution in search of just satisfaction, which will accelerate the protection of the rights and freedoms of the parties to a civil case within the framework of national judicial jurisdiction.

The primary purpose of the presented paper is to conduct comparative analysis of the institution of constitutional complaint within the legal systems of Poland and Germany. Within such analysis the author aims at establishment of an adequate relationship between two main goals of the constitutional complaint, such as: 1. the elimination of unconstitutional provisions and 2. the ensurance of human rights protection within two aforesaid legal systems. The secondary purpose of the article is to make attempt of the resolution of the issue which of the presented purposes shall gain a primacy while constituting an adequate model of the constitutional complaint. For the genuinity of the conducted analysis, the author will take into consideration such determinants as: the adapted model of the constitutional complaint (narrow limited only to legal provisions or wide), conditions of the admissibility of the constitutional complaint as well as competences of the Constitutional Court while hearing a certain constitutional complaint case. Such factors will subsequently be juxtaposed with the objective dataset, such as: yearly number of complaints submitted, yearly number of complaints accepted to the meritorical recognition, percentage of the complaints among all cases heard by the Constitutional Court and the average period of recognition of such complaint. The author will also refer to the level of satisfaction with the constitutional complaints efficiency in particular societies. Moreover the paper will rely upon the dogmatic analysis of the appropriate regulations regarding constitutional complaints in two abovementioned legal systems. The justification of the choice of presented subject comes down to necessity of the revision of the current Polish solutions regarding the constitutional complaint in order to ensure the icreasement of the efficiency of the human rights protection. Subsidiarily, the paper will also refer to the judicial practice of the European Court of Human Rights.

The study aimed to analyse how the Ukrainian legal system implements the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, as well as to identify problems and prospects for improving this process. The article used methods of legal analysis of the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, comparison of national legislation with the European Convention on Human Rights, analysis of the statistics of the European Court of Human Rights, research on the implementation of European Court of Human Rights decisions at the national level, hermeneutics to identify terminological gaps, analysis of the implementation of European standards in the national legal system, and deduction to identify key issues in cases against Ukraine. An analysis of the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights revealed numerous systemic human rights violations in Ukraine, particularly in the areas of conditions of detention, unlawful arrests and lengthy court proceedings. Problems with non-enforcement of court decisions and violations of the rights to liberty and dignity have been confirmed by numerous cases, such as Gongadze v. Ukraine and Kharchenko v. Ukraine. Amendments to the Criminal Code of Ukraine following the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, in particular the limitation of the term of pre-trial detention, have reduced the number of cases of prolonged detention The study aimed to analyse how the Ukrainian legal system implements the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, as well as to identify problems and prospects for improving this process. The article used methods of legal analysis of the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, comparison of national legislation with the European Convention on Human Rights, analysis of the statistics of the European Court of Human Rights, research on the implementation of European Court of Human Rights decisions at the national level, hermeneutics to identify terminological gaps, analysis of the implementation of European standards in the national legal system, and deduction to identify key issues in cases against Ukraine. An analysis of the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights revealed numerous systemic human rights violations in Ukraine, particularly in the areas of conditions of detention, unlawful arrests and lengthy court proceedings. Problems with non-enforcement of court decisions and violations of the rights to liberty and dignity have been confirmed by numerous cases, such as Gongadze v. Ukraine and Kharchenko v. Ukraine. Amendments to the Criminal Code of Ukraine following the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, in particular the limitation of the term of pre-trial detention, have reduced the number of cases of prolonged detention

The author explores the place and significance of the constitutional complaint institution in implementing international standards related to life imprisonment in the national legal system. Recently, following the development of these standards in international human rights law, the European Court of Human Rights declared that the absence of a predictable and transparent mechanism for reducing life imprisonment in Ukraine violates human dignity and contradicts Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights. In alignment with this perspective, in 2020, the Constitutional Court of Ukraine deemed unconstitutional provisions that prohibited parole from life imprisonment. The constitutional complaint served as a tool for Ukrainian authorities to advance the life imprisonment reform. Apart from the constitutional complaint, no other mechanism has made such a powerful influence in this process. Consequently, it is necessary to analyze the constitutional proceedings that preceded the decision and the ratio decidendi within the same decision.The paper outlines aspects of the national model of the institution of life imprisonment and international standards governing this penalty. Discrepancies in these systems are identified, and the author investigates constitutional complaints filed in response to these disparities, along with the relevant constitutional proceedings. Subsequently, the author places significant emphasis on the decision of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine resulting from the consideration of the aforementioned complaints. In the author’s opinion, this decision acted as the driving force behind the continued reform of life imprisonment. The work also briefly outlines the prospects and challenges of life imprisonment reform, implemented even under martial law conditions.

CIS members legislation regulating judicial proceedings on individual constitutional complaints is in the process of development, the relevant problems are debated by leading experts on national and international level. In view of the aforesaid this article is devoted to core concept of constitutional complaint - the model of complaint and contains comparative legal analysis of models incorporated in legislation of CIS members in different historical periods. The author proposes to enlarge the list of objects of constitutional complaint so that it includes all types of normative acts as well as individual acts, i.e. to introduce the model of full constitutional complaint. The named measures are aimed to strengthen protection of constitutional human rights in Russia and also to decrease the number of complaints against Russia filed to European Court of Human Rights.

Reopening of civil proceedings is an exclusive procedural measure, which helps to ensure a right to court. Its aim is to remove possibly unlawful court decision, thus delivering justice and avoiding consequences of such decision. Therefore, reopening of civil proceedings seeks to protect not only interests of private parties, but also public interest. However, if we look to Code of Civil procedure of the Republic of Lithuania, we can see a lack of possibility in Lithuania to reopen proceedings, when Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania declares that law applied in a specific case is in conflict with the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania. Lithuanian case law does not allow reopening of proceedings in civil cases based on mentioned ground, because otherwise principles of stability of legal relations and certainty of rights and duties of subjects“™ legal relations would be breached. Contrary to civil cases, administrative cases may be reopened based on mentioned grounds. Moreover, administrative courts examine cases regarding damages, incurred due to unlawful actions of public administration bodies, and these cases may also be reopened based on mentioned ground, though they are civil cases. Therefore, administrative courts case law and general competence courts case law differs on the question regarding reopening of proceedings in civil cases, when Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania declares that law applied in a specific case is in conflict with the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania. Meanwhile, about half European states“™ laws, which were analyzed in this work, allows to reopen civil proceedings on mentioned grounds, and almost all states allow to reopen proceedings on mentioned ground in criminal cases. Such differentiation between civil and criminal cases is explained by the principle of lex benignor retro agit: if law, which was basis in criminal or administrative case, is declared void, such law has retroactive validity, if person“˜s, who was penalized in such case, situation may be improved. Meanwhile, improving situation of one party in civil case, may worsen other party“˜s situation. However, it must be noted, that in such situation other party“˜s situation does not always worsen. Importance of violations of human rights in civil cases is underlined by European Court of Human Rights. Even though ECHR“˜s view is that reopening of proceedings is limited by principle of legal certainty, in certain cases it may be the most effective way of restoring justice, which was denied by breaching human rights. Therefore, reopening of proceedings, when Constitutional Court declares act applied in a specific case is in conflict with Constitution, is justifiable in cases of violation of human rights. Meanwhile Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania deems that reopening of proceedings on examined ground is defensive measure meant to protect constitutional human rights. Lack of possibility to reopen proceedings on examined grounds would not allow to remove unconstitutional consequences induced by unconstitutional act from Lithuanian legal system, which in turn would create preconditions to violate numerous principles and values, established in Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania, and therefore a risk to ruin foundations of the State of Lithuania, as the common good of the entire society which is consolidated in the Constitution. Moreover, reopening of proceedings would allow to accomplish person“™s right to court. By not allowing to reopen proceedings on examined grounds persons, who go to court demanding to protect their breached rights before Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania deems law as unconstitutional and persons, who go to court after deeming law as unconstitutional, are treated unequally. Because current Lithuanian case law and laws related to examined problem are in conflict with the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania, this problem should be fixed. Therefore, in this work I provide several different ways how to tackle this problem. The most logical one is to apply petition to Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania to examine constitutionality of article 366 of Civil procedure code of the Republic of Lithuania, arguing for the lack of ground to reopen proceedings in civil cases when when Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania declares that law applied in a specific case is in conflict with the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania. Other effective way to tackle this problem is preliminary constitutional control. Although, it would not be possible to examine all laws, before they come into force, but it would prevent a significant part of unconstitutional laws from entering Lithuanian legal system and would ensure persons“™ right to court.

The new General Administrative Procedure Act of 2016 introduced a number of innovations in the system of extraordinary legal remedies. From the aspect of legal protection of the parties, the most should have been expected from the changes regarding the Reopening since it is an extraordinary legal remedy, which is by far the most commonly used in administrative practice, due to its existence of process material that was unknown during the conducting of the process. However, the legal regime of this extraordinary remedy has only slightly changed. The basic changes concerns the reasons for the reopening, the time limits within which it can be used, and the circle of entities legally legitimized for filing a reopening. Regarding the reasons for reopening, as the most important element of the legal regime, only minor linguistic corrections were made and only two new reasons were added, due to which the administrative procedure in Serbia today can be reopened even if the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Serbia is in the same administrative matter, the constitutional complaint, found a violation or denial of the human or minority rights and freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution, while not annulling the impugned decision, as well as if the European Court of Human Rights subsequently found in the same administrative matter that rights or freedom of the applicant are violated or denied. Due to the inadequately set objective deadline for filing a Reopening Procedure, which is inappropriately short for this type of reason, the practical importance of prescribing these two new Reopening procedure grounds is greatly diminished. In addition, by omitting the Public Prosecutor, the circle of entities legally legitimized for the Reopening is reduced only to the party from the administrative procedure and the administrative body that issued the final administrative act, which can be repeated ex officio, which in no way contributes, not only to improvement legal protection of the parties to the proceedings, but also the possibility of achieving a greater degree of objective legality in resolving administrative matter.

This article explores the effectiveness of constitutional complaint procedures as domestic remedies within the meaning of Articles 13 and 35 para. 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). It examines the standards applied by the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) to domestic remedies in general, as well as the specific criteria relating to constitutional complaints, in order to determine what criteria are applied to assess their effectiveness. The paper focuses on the Hungarian and Polish models of constitutional complaint and analyzes the ECtHR’s relevant case-law to establish whether, and under what circumstances, constitutional complaint procedures in these two Central European countries can be considered effective domestic remedies within the meaning of Articles 13 and 35 para. 1 of the ECHR. The analysis shows that the ECtHR’s assessment of the effectiveness of constitutional complaints can shift over time, departing from an objective legal framework toward a broader and more ambiguous evaluation of institutional and political developments affecting constitutional adjudication.

Regional human rights courts like the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR), and the African Court of Human and People's Rights (ACtHPR) have become popular sites of mobilization for victims and activists who seek justice when justice fails at home. Besides being platforms for individual remedy, human rights courts increasingly shape social norms and state policy within countries, making them attractive avenues for rights advocates to develop new norms or to push domestic authorities to reform legislation. The judges of these courts can decide, for example, whether same-sex couples have a right to be married, if prisoners have the right to vote or receive HIV/AIDS treatment, or when a state can deport illegal immigrants to a country where they will likely be tortured. As these courts pass their judgments, they often find themselves in conflict with states that are violating human rights of marginalized groups on a large scale and are unwilling to implement international rulings. Although international human rights courts have become increasingly popular venues among victims and activists who seek justice when justice fails at home, we are only beginning to understand how activists play roles in shaping the development of regional human rights courts' case law—the body of judgments that shapes how judges will make their decisions in the future. We now have plenty of international relations and international legal research on the interactions between states and international courts: how judges in these courts wrestle between deferring to the interests of member state governments whose actions are on trial and sticking closely to the conventions' fundamental yet evolving principles (Alter et al., 2019; Helfer & Voeten, 2014). As some states begin to resist international courts' authority, scholars have begun to examine the dynamics of this backlash (Hillebrecht, 2022; Madsen et al., 2018; Sandholtz et al., 2018). Recent studies have also demonstrated that human rights advocates—whether NGOs or individual lawyers—have a significant impact on shaping the jurisprudence of international courts and the impact judgments have in concrete locations (Kahraman, 2018; Sundstrom, 2014; van der Vet, 2012; Kurban, 2020; Conant, 2018; Harms, 2021; Cichowski, 2016; Hodson, 2011; Haddad, 2018). Meanwhile, these advocates themselves have been subject to repression and stigmatization by governments as part of the backlash phenomenon. Without an adequate understanding of the factors shaping activists' engagement with international courts, we risk undervaluing their strategic impact on the expansion of case law, the human rights protection of marginalized groups who cannot find remedies at home, and the domestic implementation of these judgments in an age of state backlash. In this section, we summarize the three papers contained in this symposium and their original contributions to these themes. Over the last decade, dozens of countries have erected legal barriers or started vilifying campaigns to stymie the work of NGOs (Buyse, 2018; Chaudhry, 2022). One tactic in this toolkit is the enactment of burdensome regulation on NGOs that receive funds from foreign donors as they allegedly promote foreign agendas (Christensen & Weinstein, 2013; Dupuy et al., 2021). States that frequently abuse human rights are especially prone to target NGOs that engage in strategic litigation (Hillebrecht, 2019). Most NGOs depend on foreign funding, and NGOs that litigate international cases fall disproportionately in this category, but do funders affect the selection of cases? In “Foreign Agents or Agents of Justice? Private Foundations, NGO Backlash, and International Human Rights Litigation,” Heidi Haddad and Lisa Sundstrom examine the extent to which Western donors, particularly private foundations, have encouraged NGOs in Europe to litigate at the ECtHR as a human rights advocacy strategy. They examine overall patterns of donor funding and NGO litigation records, and look in more detail at the case of Russian NGOs' foreign funding and litigation records. The analysis is extremely timely, as the Russian government's criminalization of independent civil society actors, especially in the human rights field, and their accusation that foreign funding turns NGOs into “foreign agents” have been crucial elements of the Russian regime's autocratization. This claim has also provided fuel for Russia's disenchantment with the ECtHR in recent years, contributing to the assessment of many observers that Russia's full-scale attack on Ukraine was the last straw in an inevitable collision course leading to its exit from the Council of Europe. Haddad and Sundstrom debunk the idea that foreign donors are pushing NGOs toward strategies of human rights litigation. Instead, they argue, there is more evidence that NGOs themselves promoted the mechanism of international litigation as a strategy that donors later adopted. This article is a poignant reminder of the advocacy tools that Russian human rights activists and citizens have lost as a result of their government's departure from the Council of Europe, including ECtHR jurisdiction. Yet it also provides insight into the likely roles of foreign donors in other country cases where NGOs are using international court litigation as a human rights advocacy strategy, which is often a target of the ire of national governments, as explored in the next article in the symposium. When states attack human rights NGOs within their borders and/or international human rights courts themselves, how does this affect the willingness of those NGOs to take cases to international courts, and the ways in which they do so? De Silva and Plagis ask this question in their article about state backlash against NGOs in the case of Tanzania and the African Court on Human and Peoples' Rights. A fascinating empirical question they pose is: does state backlash against NGOs increase NGO litigation at international courts (to contest state repression at those courts and use international mechanisms when domestic ones are not available), roughly in line with Keck and Sikkink's famous “boomerang pattern” (Keck & Sikkink, 1998), or decrease it due to heightened fear and restricted NGO capabilities that state repression creates? Employing a process-tracing analysis of NGOs' involvement in three cases before the African Court at different stages of the Tanzanian government's backlash against the Court, De Silva and Plagis find that “two-level backlash” by states can result in both phenomena, either promoting or deterring NGO legal mobilization at international human rights courts, depending on certain conditions. The three selected cases concerning the death penalty, the rights of persons with albinism, and the rights of pregnant schoolgirls and mothers, which took place at different time periods, demonstrate a number of patterns of state backlash interacting with NGO strategies. The authors find that domestic-level state backlash deterred domestic NGOs from partnering with international NGOs in litigation, but that such backlash, when it repressed domestic political and legal mobilization opportunities, actually encouraged both Tanzanian and international NGOs to turn to the African Court more frequently to seek remedies. International-level backlash in turn only deterred NGOs from international litigation when such backlash consisted of state efforts to restrict NGOs' ability to engage in litigation, and not when the international backlash was in the form of routine noncompliance with African Court rulings. Importantly, the authors find that NGO responses to state backlash were significantly shaped by their degree of legal consciousness and expertise with the rules, proceedings, and workings of the African Court. Those NGOs with less knowledge and experience were more likely to back away from engaging with the Court under the pressure of state backlash. De Silva and Plagis conclude that “NGOs' persistent human rights advocacy in the face of state backlash is a double-edged sword,” in the sense that they may not be deterred by state backlash initially, but there is a danger that their continued determination to engage in international litigation could prompt governments to engage in even more severe forms of backlash, with critical impacts on international courts and already vulnerable human rights defenders. Rights advocates have a growing menu of institutions and courts available to them. How do activists choose at which institution to lodge their cases in a world where legal remedies have diversified, or as some have argued, fragmented (Koskenniemi & Leino, 2002)? In “What Makes an International Institution Work for Labor Activists? Shaping International Law through Strategic Litigation,” Filiz Kahraman goes beyond the tendency of legal mobilization studies to only examine how activists interact with a single court or institution. Instead, Kahraman opens up how rights advocates imagine which institution is most receptive to their claims. Drawing on a comparative interview study of British and Turkish trade union activists and their legal mobilization campaigns at international courts and quasi-judicial institutions like the International Labor Organization (ILO), Kahraman examines how activists first probe and then strategically identify which court or international institution is most susceptible to their primary goals of influencing structural reforms and setting new norms. Through this probing process—or dynamic signaling game between courts and litigants—activists push a court's jurisprudence and case law into new issue areas. For instance, at the ECtHR, Turkish trade unionists challenged domestic courts' ruling that public sector workers did not have the right to establish unions, even though the ECtHR had no established case law on labor rights in 1990s. They won the case, with the ECtHR finding that Turkey violated the right of public sector workers to unionize. These cases not only had an impact within Turkey, but over the next decades, similar cases brought by British unionists would spin off the early precedent set by the Turkish legal mobilization efforts. Kahraman argues that they ultimately pushed the ECtHR to recognize the basic trade union rights as fundamental human rights. Kahraman sheds light on the often hidden strategies behind international litigation. Activists litigate not just for the immediate impact on the current case they work on, but how they envision that all the cases they work on may shape norms and domestic structural reforms further in the future. Whether an institution is perceptive of claims lies in the eye of the beholder. Kahraman finds that besides targeting institutions with high compliance rates, they also take cases to institutions with low rates of compliance, especially “if these institutions have extensive judicial authority to create new international norms.” So, it is not the de jure protection set by an international courts, but rather how activists perceive the juridical responsiveness and judicial authority of courts—or, how judges adopt either an activist approach or restraint in response to incoming cases and how willing states are to implement cases of a court, respectively—that determines why activists select certain courts or quasi-judicial institutions (like the ILO). Kahraman gives us new tools to interpret how activists perceive authority and receptiveness and respond to opportunities. Rather than static external legal remedies, courts and quasi-judicial institutions are opportunity structures that are malleable to the strategic vision of the activist or litigant. The articles in this symposium together reveal a number of key overlapping insights. At the broadest level, they demonstrate that activists' behaviors and strategies influence international courts' jurisprudence, politics within states, and the human rights outcomes of everyday citizens—and these influences have often been hidden in our existing canon of research on international courts. In addition, all of these articles show that, while activists may face challenges in their efforts, often including significant backlash from their home state governments, they also continue to retain significant agency through their creative efforts to develop legal strategies and circumvent state repression. Activists perennially innovate: sparking the ideas that inspire donors who fund them; calculating how to continue their litigation work when government actors threaten them; and taking risks in litigation to push courts to expand how they define human rights. However, along with these uplifting conclusions, there are worrying patterns that demand future research. States are increasingly pushing back against the powers of international courts to bind them to costly measures, and as this symposium has shown, national governments often point to activists as contributors to this “problem” of invasive international human rights standards. A growing body of research has tracked how human rights defenders of all kinds globally are under threat from actors like governments and corporations who disagree with their contentious actions. We need more studies that gather comprehensive data and systematically track these threats, specifically with regard to activists who engage in international human rights litigation. We suspect that such activists are likely disproportionately targeted due to the international visibility of their complaints. We also desperately need research into possible innovative responses to these threats to activists—responses from activists, funders, governments of countries that support human rights, and international courts themselves. Freek van der Vet is a University Researcher at the Erik Castrén Institute of International Law and Human Rights, Faculty of Law, University of Helsinki and the principal investigator of the Toxic Crimes Project. Lisa McIntosh Sundstrom is Professor of Political Science at the University of British Columbia. She is the director of the ActinCourts network at UBC and conducts research on legal mobilization by Russian activists.

Resolving controversial issues related to the content of evaluative features in the context of the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights is important for the development of legal science and practice, since increased integration within Europe requires national governments and judicial systems to pay increased attention to the practice of supranational bodies. The purpose of this study is to analyse the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights, aimed at determining the content of the evaluative features in the context of human rights. For this purpose, the author uses the methods of legal literature analysis, comparative analysis of case law from different countries, synthesis, comparison, and modelling, as well as logical and systematic approaches to the analysis of court decisions. The article establishes that the assessment criteria are an important tool for determining human rights violations and require an objective and proportionate approach. Attention is focused on the role of the European Court of Human Rights in ensuring a balance between freedom of expression and the protection of human rights. The author identifies the need to adapt concepts to digital environments and take into account new challenges. The author analyses the process of determining the evaluative features and demonstrates its significance for establishing the scope of human rights protection. The author identifies different approaches of the European Court of Justice to determining the content of evaluative features in human rights judgments. The emphasis is placed on the interpretation of such concepts as “adequacy”, “excessiveness” and “necessity” in the context of human rights restrictions. The author identifies changes in the court's approach to these concepts over time and changes in the social and political context. The study is important for an in-depth understanding of the interpretation of human rights by the European Court of Human Rights, as well as for the formation of a unified methodology for interpreting the evaluative features in the judgments of courts of different jurisdictions

This study examined the search of housing and workplace in terrorist crimes within the framework of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights. The study aims to minimize the human rights violations that may occur during housing and workplace searches. The method of the study is the application of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights to housing and workplace searches. Methodologically, the introduction part of the study reviewed the human rights violations that may occur in search operations or practices in the context of terrorist crimes. In the development section of the study, the way the European Court of Human Rights evaluates cases related to housing and workplace searches and the criteria that it applies were determined. Later, it was examined together with the Criminal Procedure Code No. 5271 examined by the European Court of Human Rights on housing and workplace searches. Then, the decisions of European Court of Human Rights related to relatively old-dated cases in Türkiye were examined and criticisms were provided against the European Court of Human Rights. In the conclusion section of the study, recommendations have been provided on how housing and workplace searches should be conducted in the context of human rights, in line with the data obtained from the case law of the European Court of Human Rights.

The article analyses the process of applying the European Court of Human Rights case law and the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of 1950 in criminal proceedings in Ukraine. The basic principles arising from the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights and their impact on national legislation and court practice are investigated. Particular attention is paid to the issues of observance of the right to a fair trial, presumption of innocence, prohibition of torture and effective investigation of human rights violations. The key cases of the European Court of Human Rights against Ukraine, which have determined the directions of reforms in the field of criminal justice, are analysed. The problems of implementation of the European Court of Human Rights case law in the criminal justice system of Ukraine, in particular, the formal approach to the use of case law, the lack of an effective mechanism for the execution of judgments and insufficient training of law enforcement and law enforcement agencies are investigated. The following prospects for improving the application of the European Court of Human Rights case law in criminal proceedings in Ukraine are identified: 1) the amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine to comply with European standards, in particular, with regard to the right to a fair trial, the presumption of innocence, protection against torture and unlawful detention, ill-treatment, etc.; 2) the development of recommendations to improve the training of judges, prosecutors, lawyers and pre-trial investigation bodies; 3) the strengthening of control over the observance of human rights, the reasonableness of the time limits during the pre-trial investigation, and fair and lawful trial; The following prospects for improving the application of the European Court of Human Rights case law in criminal proceedings in Ukraine are identified: 4) the improvement of procedures for verification, evaluation and examination of evidence in order to protect the defence from unlawful actions of the prosecution; 5) the introduction of mechanisms for the effective implementation of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights in individual cases; 6) the provision of adequate funding and resources to law enforcement and law enforcement agencies.

The article is devoted to the study of the significance and place of practice of the European Court of Human Rights in the national civil procedural legislation of Ukraine.An analysis of the provisions of the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and its Protocols, which is part of the national legislation of Ukraine, as a valid international treaty, the consent to the binding of which was given by the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, and it was found that the main task of the European Court of Human Rights of a person is, first of all, control over the implementation of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of 1950 by the countries that directly signed it.It was determined that the decision of the European Court of Human Rights is an extremely important legal practice that should be used to supplement national legislation, as well as to directly improve the methods of protecting civil rights and bring the norms of law, in this case, civil and civil procedural, closer to European standards.It has been established that the courts apply the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and the practice of the ECtHR as a source of law.The practice of the European Court of Human Rights is an official form of interpretation of the basic (inalienable) rights of every person, enshrined and guaranteed by the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, which is part of the national legislation of Ukraine, and in this connection, a source of legislative legal regulation and law enforcement in Ukraine.Based on the results of the study, it was concluded that the great importance of the practice of the ECtHR for the civil justice of Ukraine is due to the fact that the Court interprets the provisions of the Convention and its Protocols comprehensively, taking into account international experience and changes in the world that are currently taking place, so that such an interpretation reflects the realities of today.The practice of the European Court of Human Rights occupies a prominent place as a source of civil procedural law of Ukraine, since, taking into account Ukraine’s desire for European integration, Ukrainian courts increasingly refer to specific decisions of the European Court of Human Rights in civil cases as a legal justification for their chosen position.Therefore, we can define the practice of the European Court of Human Rights as a source of civil and civil procedural law, which must be applied interdependently and in an inseparable combination with the provisions of the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and its Protocols, considered as a complete “living organism”.