Bírósági ítéletek anonimizálása Nagy Britanniában

Az előző bejegyzéshez tartozik néhány részlet az A, K and M v HM Treasury (Anonimity) [2010] UKSC 1 ítéletből. A kérdés: jogszerű -e a terrorakciók előkészítésének támogatásával gyanúsított brit állampolgárok nevének teljes anonimizálása. Részletek az ítéletből:

1. “Your first term docket reads like alphabet soup.” With these provocative words counsel for a number of newspapers and magazines highlighted the issue which confronts the Court in this application. In all the cases down for hearing in the first month of the Supreme Court’s existence at least one of the parties was referred to by an initial or initials.

22. In the United Kingdom, until the recent efflorescence of anonymity orders, the general rule both in theory and in practice was that judicial proceedings were held in public and the parties were named in judgments. Their names would also be given in newspaper reports and in the law reports. That is still usually the position – as can be seen from the frequent press reports of, say, employment tribunal hearings and decisions where details of personal and sexual relationships among the warring parties are a common feature.

43. The case is, accordingly, one where both articles 8 and 10 are in play and the Court has to weigh the competing claims of M and his family under article 8 and of the press under article 10. More particularly, the Court is being asked, on the one hand, to give effect to the right of the press to freedom of expression and, on the other, to ensure that the press respect M’s private and family life.

44. M objects to being identified as a person who is challenging the freezing orders against him which proceed on the basis that the Treasury suspects on reasonable grounds that he facilitates, or may facilitate, terrorism. In other words, what he really objects to is being identified as a person who the Treasury suspects, on what it regards as reasonable grounds, facilitates or may facilitate terrorism. He maintains that, if he is identified as such a person, his article 8 Convention rights will be infringed in the various ways outlined in para 21.

51. Lord Hoffmann’s formulation was adopted by Lord Hope of Craighead in In re BBC [2009] 3 WLR 142, 149, para 17. Since “neither article has as such precedence over the other” (In re S (A Child) (Identification: Restrictions on Publication) [2005] 1 AC 593, 603, para 17, per Lord Steyn), the weight to be attached to the rival interests under articles 8 and 10 - and so the interest which is to prevail in any competition - will depend on the facts of the particular case. In this connexion it should be borne in mind that – picking up the terminology used in the Von Hannover case - the European Court has suggested that, where the publication concerns a question “of general interest”, article 10(2) scarcely leaves any room for restrictions on freedom of expression: Petrina v Romania (application no 78060/01), 14 October 2008, para 40 (“l’article 10(2) de la Convention ne laisse guère de place pour des restrictions à la liberté d’expression dans le domaine … des questions d’intérêt général”).

52. In the present case M’s private and family life are interests which must be respected. On the other side, publication of a report of the proceedings, including a report identifying M, is a matter of general, public interest. Applying Lord Hoffmann’s formulation, the question for the court accordingly is whether there is sufficient general, public interest in publishing a report of the proceedings which identifies M to justify any resulting curtailment of his right and his family’s right to respect for their private and family life.

54. In France, for instance, until recently, the general rule was that the parties’ names were published. This led to an interesting case brought by the husband against the publishers of a law report of a divorce case in which he had been the defendant. The report identified him and the judgment gave embarrassing details about his sexual habits: Franconville c Gazette du Palais, Tribunal de grande instance de Paris 8.12.1971, Gaz Pal 1971, 2 Jur 836; Page 20 Gazette du Palais c Franconville, Cour d’appel de Paris 12.1.1973, Gaz Pal 1973, 1 Jur 137. The appeal court held in favour of the publishers and - rather as in Britain - legislation was subsequently brought in to change the law on the reporting of matrimonial cases. In 2001, however, the Commission Nationale de l’Informatique et des Libertés recommended that, if decisions were going to be made available free of charge on the internet, then they should be anonymised. Since 2002 the Cour de cassation has chosen to follow that recommendation and usually its decisions now appear without the parties’ names. The Recueil Dalloz gives the parties’ names in the headings, but prints the anonymised version of the text of the judgment. It is important to note that the press can, and do, consult the lists of cases, where the names appear, and in this way they are able to identify the parties when reporting the proceedings.

55. In Italy the general position is the same as it was in France before the changes initiated in 2002. In Germany, by contrast, the practice since the time of the Reichsgericht has been for the courts and the official reports to refer to the parties by the initials of their surnames or of their firm or company name. Also the parties’ lawyers are not identified. The practice in Austria is broadly similar.

56. Until recently, the German courts rigidly followed this practice even where a case had received wide publicity and the names of the parties were actually well known to the public. They did the same when the judgment referred to the holder of a particular office, such as the Federal Chancellor, whose identity was common knowledge. The results could be risible and so, more recently, the courts have abandoned the practice in cases where the identity of a party, such as Princess Caroline of Monaco, is well known to the press and everyone else. [...] The usual practice means that it is sometimes only when a case reaches the European Court of Justice or the European Court of Human Rights and the names are published for the first time in their judgments that people in Germany discover who the parties actually are. See Siehr, “Veröffentlichte Gerichtsentscheidungen”, pp 482-483.

57. Despite criticisms, the German courts have followed the same practice for considerably more than a century. Some scholars have argued that a legal basis or justification for the practice can be found in the constitutional right of individuals to control of their personal data, as developed in the 1983 Page 21 Constitutional Court judgment on the Census Law (Volkszählungsurteil): BVerfGE 65, 1. All that needs to be said for present purposes is that this is certainly not the origin of the courts’ practice, which existed long before the German Federal Constitution. Even now, there is doubt about the exact explanation for it. One suggestion is that the courts do not mention the names because their view of the law must be seen to be objective and unaffected by the standing of the parties or their lawyers. At all events, when it uses initials and supplies the public with a version in which the parties’ names are blanked out from the rubric, a German court is not trying to control how the case is to be reported by the press. Newspapers are free to use their own knowledge to identify the individuals involved and to name them in any report of the proceedings or judgment. While an anonymous version of the judgment may usually meet the needs of lawyers, the target audience of the press is likely to be different and to have a different interest in the proceedings, which will not be satisfied by an anonymised version of the judgment. In the general run of cases there is nothing to stop the press from supplying the more full-blooded account which their readers want.

59. As one of the witness statements lodged on his behalf acknowledges, if publication were permitted, M would not be identified as someone who facilitated terrorism, but as someone whom the Treasury claims to have reasonable grounds to suspect of facilitating terrorism. But his fear is that, however accurate the reporting, members of the public would simply proceed on the basis that he is a terrorist. So the ban on publication, he says, should remain in place to prevent this.

60. That argument raises an important point of principle. It really amounts to saying that the press must be prevented from printing what is true as a matter of fact, for fear that some of those reading the reports may misinterpret them and act inappropriately. Doubtless, some may indeed draw the unjustified inference that M fears. But the public are by now very familiar with the argument that various measures, including control orders, have been taken against people who are merely suspected of involvement in terrorism, precisely because the authorities cannot prove that they are actually involved. Politicians and the press have frequently debated the merits of that approach, the debates presupposing that members of the public, including members of the Muslim community, are more than capable of drawing the distinction between mere suspicion and sufficient evidence to prove guilt. Any other assumption would make public discussion of these and similar serious matters impossible. We therefore see no reason to assume that most members of the local Muslim community would be unable to draw the necessary distinction and to respond appropriately to any revelation that the Treasury suspects that M facilitates, or may facilitate, terrorism.

63. What’s in a name? “A lot”, the press would answer. This is because stories about particular individuals are simply much more attractive to readers than stories about unidentified people. It is just human nature. And this is why, of course, even when reporting major disasters, journalists usually look for a story about how particular individuals are affected. Writing stories which Page 23 capture the attention of readers is a matter of reporting technique, and the European Court holds that article 10 protects not only the substance of ideas and information but also the form in which they are conveyed: News Verlags GmbH & Co KG v Austria (2000) 31 EHRR 246, 256, para 39, quoted at para 35 above. More succinctly, Lord Hoffmann observed in Campbell v MGN Ltd [2004] 2 AC 457, 474, para 59, “judges are not newspaper editors.” See also Lord Hope of Craighead in In re British Broadcasting Corpn [2009] 3 WLR 142, 152, para 25. This is not just a matter of deference to editorial independence. The judges are recognising that editors know best how to present material in a way that will interest the readers of their particular publication and so help them to absorb the information. A requirement to report it in some austere, abstract form, devoid of much of its human interest, could well mean that the report would not be read and the information would not be passed on. Ultimately, such an approach could threaten the viability of newspapers and magazines, which can only inform the public if they attract enough readers and make enough money to survive.

66. Importantly, a more open attitude would be consistent with the true view that freezing orders are merely indicative of suspicions about matters which the prosecuting authorities accept they cannot prove in a court of law. The identities of persons charged with offences are published, even though their trial may be many months off. In allowing this, the law proceeds on the basis that most members of the public understand that, even when charged with an offence, you are innocent unless and until proved guilty in a court of law. That understanding can be expected to apply, a fortiori, if you are someone whom the prosecuti ng authorities are not even in a position to charge with an offence and bring to court. But, by concealing the identities of the individuals who are subject to freezing orders, the courts are actually helping to foster an impression that the mere making of the orders justifies sinister conclusions about these individuals. That is particularly unfortunate when, as was emphasised on the appellants’ behalf, they are unlikely to have any opportunity to challenge the alleged factual basis for making the orders.

68. Certainly, the identities of the claimants cannot affect the answers that this Court gives to the legal questions in the substantive appeals. So those identities may not matter particularly to the judges. But the legitimate interest of the public is wider than the interest of judges qua judges or of lawyers qua lawyers. Irrespective of the outcome, the public has a legitimate interest in not being kept in the dark about who are challenging the TOs and the AQO. The case of HAY is instructive in this respect. Most people will be astonished, for example, to learn that, up until now, the courts have prevented them from discovering that one of the claimants, Mr Youssef, has already successfully sued the Home Secretary for wrongful detention after a failed attempt to deport him to Egypt. Equally importantly, even while the Treasury is defending these proceedings brought by him, the Government are trying to have his name removed from the 1267 Committee list. Meanwhile, he is busy writing and broadcasting from London on Middle East matters.

72. Of course, allowing the press to identify M and the other appellants would not be risk-free. It is conceivable that some of the press coverage might be outrageously hostile to M and the other appellants – even though nothing particularly significant appears to have been published when Mr al-Ghabra’s identity was revealed. But the possibility of some sectors of the press abusing their freedom to report cannot, of itself, be a sufficient reason for curtailing that freedom for all members of the press. James Madison long ago pointed out that “Some degree of abuse is inseparable from the proper use of everything, and in no instance is this more true than in that of the press”: “Report on the Virginia Resolutions” (1800), in Letters and Other Writings of James Madison (1865) Vol 4, p 544. The Press Complaints Commission is the appropriate body for dealing with any lapses in behaviour by the press. The possibility of abuse is therefore simply one factor to be taken into account when considering whether an anonymity order is a proportionate restriction on press freedom in this situation.

73. Although it has effects on the individual’s private life, the purpose of a freezing order is public: it is to prevent the individual concerned from transferring funds to people who have nothing to do with his family life. So this is not a situation where the press are wanting to publish a story about some aspect of an individual’s private life, whether trivial or significant. Rather, they are being prevented from publishing a complete account of an important public matter involving this particular individual, for fear of the incidental effect that it would have on M’s private and family life.

Az ENSZ terrorizmus-ellenes határoztainak végrehajtása Nagy-Britanniában

FRISSITÉS (február 9.) Február 4-én a legfelsőbb bíróság elutasította a pénzügyminisztérium felfüggesztő hatályra vonatkozó kérelmét, Ahmed & Ors v HM Treasury (No 2) [2010] UKSC 5

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A brit Legfelsőbb Bíróság ma délelőtt az A v HM Treasury [2010] UKSC 2 ügyben ultra vires-nek minősítette és hatályon kívűl helyezte az ENSZ BT pénzbefagyasztásról szóló határozatait átültető brit jogszabályt (rövid press release itt).

Mindig érdemes beleolvasni a lordok ítéleteibe, így a mostaniba is.

Nemzetbiztonsági érdek v. szabadságjogok - az USA szövetségi bírósága és "extraordinary rendition"

Pár hónappal ezelőtt a United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit 11-fős tanácsa egy ún. en banc felülvizsgálat keretében, 7-4 arányban (újra) elutasította a kanadai-szír kettős állampolgár Maher Arar, amerikai tisztségviselők ellen, indított kártérítési keresetét. Az indokolás szerint a a bíróságnak nincs hatásköre, mivel szenzitív külpolitikai és nemzetbiztonsági dokumentumokat is vizsgálnia kellene.

A tunéziai nyaralásából Montreálba tartó Arart a New-York-i Kennedy reptéren tartóztatták fel; az Al-Kaida-hoz fűződő kapcsoltai miatt az USA-ból, mint terroristagyanús személyt kiutasították, majd először Jordániába aztán pedig onnan Szíriába deportálták. A férfit itt több héten keresztül kínozták és hallgatták ki a szír hatóságok.

A 184 oldalas Arar v. Ashcroft, et al. ítélet elolvasása előtt, érdemes először a New York Review of Books-ban megjelent David Cole cikkel kezdeni.

A többségi ítélet szerint:

“A suit seeking a damages remedy against senior officials who implement an extraordinary rendition policy would enmesh the courts ineluctably in an assessment of the validity and rationale of that policy and its implementation in this particular case, matters that directly affect significant diplomatic and national security concerns. It is clear from the face of the complaint that Arar explicitly targets the “policy” of extraordinary rendition; he cites the policy twice in his complaint, and submits documents and media reports concerning the practice. His claim cannot proceed without inquiry into the perceived need for the policy, the threats to which it responds, the substance and sources of the intelligence used to formulate it, and the propriety of adopting specific responses to particular threats in light of apparent geopolitical circumstances and our relations with foreign countries”. (p. 39-40.)

Sack bíró a következő szavakkal illette a fentebbieket:

"The majority's notion that because the presumption is likely to be overcome in a particular species of case we should therefore foreclose a remedy or otherwise limit our jurisdiction in order to accommodate the public suspicion of secrecy, is misconceived. Denying relief to a n entire class of persons with presumably legitimate claims in part because some of their number may lose in proceedings that are held in secret or because secrets may cause some such claims to fail, makes little sense to us. It could work endless mischief were courts to turn their backs on such cases, their litigants, and the litigants' asserted rights. We are not aware of any other area of our jurisprudence where the ability to overcome the presumption of openness has been relied upon to deny a remedy to a litigant. We do not think it should be here". (p. 132-133)

A negyedik különvéleményt megfogalmazó Calabresi bíró kirívóan erős szavakkal illette a a többségi ítéletet:

“I respectfully dissent. I join Judge Sack’s, Judge Parker’s, and Judge Pooler’s dissenting opinions in full. But, because I believe that when the history of this distinguished court is written, today’s majority decision will be viewed with dismay, I add a few words of my own, ‘...more in sorrow than in anger.’ Hamlet, act 1, sc. 2.

My colleagues have already provided ample reason to regret the path the majority has chosen. In its utter subservience to the executive branch, its distortion of Bivens doctrine, its unrealistic pleading standards, its misunderstanding of the TVPA and of § 1983, as well as in its persistent choice of broad dicta where narrow analysis would have sufficed, the majority opinion goes seriously astray. It does so, moreover, with the result that a person—whom we must assume (a) was totally innocent and (b) was made to suffer excruciatingly (c) through the misguided deeds of individuals acting under color of federal law—is effectively left without a U.S. remedy. See especially dissenting opinion of Judge Parker.

All this, as the other dissenters have powerfully demonstrated, is surely bad enough. I write to discuss one last failing, an unsoundness that, although it may not be the most significant to Maher Arar himself, is of signal importance to us as federal judges: the majority’s unwavering willfulness. It has engaged in what properly can be described as extraordinary judicial activism.[1] It has violated long-standing canons of restraint that properly must guide courts when they face complex and searing questions that involve potentially fundamental constitutional rights. It has reached out to decide an issue that should not have been resolved at this stage of Arar’s case. Moreover, in doing this, the court has justified its holding with side comments (as to other fields of law such as torts) that are both sweeping and wrong. That the majority - made up of colleagues I greatly respect - has done all this with the best of intentions, and in the belief that its holding is necessary in a time of crisis, I do not doubt. But this does not alter my conviction that in calmer times, wise people will ask themselves: how could such able and worthy judges have done that?” (p. 169-170.)

"Denying a Bivens remedy because state secrets might be revealed is a bit like denying a criminal trial for fear that a juror might be intimidated: it allows a risk, that the law is already at great pains to eliminate, to negate entirely substantial rights and procedures. Even more mystifying is the majority’s insistence that it is respecting “[t]he preference for open rather than clandestine court proceedings.” Maj. Op. at 47.

How, exactly, does the majority promote openness by shaping a constitutional decision around the fact that state secrets might be involved in a claim? The state secrets doctrine is undoubtedly in tension with the public right of access to the courts, but the majority’s approach is more opaque than any state secrets resolution. When a court properly applies the state secrets doctrine, the case at bar will proceed only if the alleged state secrets are not vital to a claim or defense, so there should be little fear that a substantive holding will ultimately turn on secret material. By contrast, consider the harm done to the openness of the court system by what the majority does here. It bars any action in the face of what we are required to assume are outrageous constitutional violations, and it does so simply because state secrets might possibly be involved, without having a court look into that very question. As a result, even if the Government’s claimed need for secrecy turned out to be wholly illusory, there would be no recourse!

Indeed, even if the Government declassified every document relating to this case, even if all four countries involved announced that they had nothing to hide and that Arar’s claim should proceed so that they could be exonerated, there would be no open judicial testing of Arar’s allegations. Which approach should give us more cause to hesitate?" (p. 177-178)

[1] I use this much abused phrase “judicial activism,” in its literal sense, to mean the unnecessary reaching out to decide issues that need not be resolved, the violation of what Chief Justice Roberts called “the cardinal principle of judicial restraint—if it is not necessary to decide more, it is necessary not to decide more.” PDK Labs., Inc. v. U.S. DEA, 362 F.3d 786, 799 (D.C. Cir. 2004) (Roberts, J., concurring).

A szövetségi bíróságok állóháborúja Guantanamó ügyben

A Brookings Institute két szerzője, “The Emerging Law of Detention-The Guantánamo Habeas Cases as Lawmaking” címmel jelentette meg az eddigi legátfogóbb tanulmányt az amerikai szövetségi bíróságok előtt majd’ másfél éve húzódó, a guantanamói foglyok által a fogvatartásuk jogszerűsége miatt indított több tucat eljárásról.

Az összefoglaló tanulmányt a SCOTUSBLOG veterán Guantanamó-kommentátora, Lyle Denniston veti alá kritikus elemzésnek itt.

A holland Irak vizsgálóbizottság jelentése

A holland miniszterelnök által felkért Irak vizsgálóbizottság (Onderzoekcommissie Irak) január 12-én hozta nyilvánosságra 550 oldalas jelentését (a teljes szöveg hollandul itt, a hosszabb angol összefoglaló itt, a főbb következtetések innen tölthetőek le).

A jelentés, többek között, megállapítja:

That the government of the day subordinated the question of legitimacy under international law to the policy principles defined by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in August 2002. Similarly, insufficient importance was attached to the information provided by the intelligence services and the weapons inspection reports. On the subject of international legitimacy, the Committee of Inquiry concludes that the Security Council resolutions on Iraq passed during the 1990s did not constitute a mandate for the US-British military intervention in 2003. Despite the existence of certain ambiguities, the wording of Resolution 1441 cannot reasonably be interpreted (as the Dutch government did) as authorizing individual Member States to use military force to compel Iraq to comply with the Security Council’s resolutions, without authorization from the Security Council.

With regard to the information provided by the intelligence services and the international weapons inspection reports, the Committee of Inquiry concludes that neither the AIVD (General Intelligence and Security Service) nor the MIVD (Military Intelligence and Security Service) possessed any significant amount of independently sourced information about Iraq’s WMD programme. Both services based their assessments largely on the reports of the UN weapons inspectors and information supplied by foreign intelligence services. Nevertheless, the Committee takes the view that, over the period as a whole, the MIVD and the AIVD were more reserved in their assessments of the threat posed by Iraq’s WMD programme than government ministers were in their communications with the Lower House. According to the Committee of Inquiry, the reports made by the AIVD and in particular the MIVD concerning WMD were more nuanced than the public reports from other countries. These nuances were not reflected by the relevant ministers or departments; rather, ministers and departments extracted those statements from the intelligence services’ reports that were consistent with the stance already adopted. The Committee’s assessment is that, in its portrayal of Iraq’s WMD programme, the government was to a considerable extent led by public and other information from the US and the UK. In its discussions with the parliamentary Intelligence and Security Services Committee, the government did not allude to the nuances of the reports made by the MIVD and the AIVD. Contrary to the facts reported by the Committee of Inquiry, the Minister of Defence asserted in parliament that the AIVD and MIVD reports were not inconsistent with the public statements made by ministers.

Alkotmánybíróságunk hatékonyságáról a Jogvélemény blogon

A Jogvélemény blogon élénk vita alakult ki alkotmánybíróságunk határozatelőkészítő hatékonyságáról és minőségéről, az alkotmánybírák és tanácsadóik le(nem)terheltségéről (lásd AB statisztika 2009 bejegyzés és kapcsolódó kommentek). A blog szerzője, Kobayashi pár nappal később egy komplett AB hatásfokjavító javaslatcsomaggal állt elő, köztük egy gyakornoki rendszer bevezetésével (lásd menedzsment bejegyzés).

Üdítően gondolatébresztő olvasmány!

Összefoglaló - Izrael, megszállt területek

Címszavakban:

- A Public Committee Against Torture elmúlt tíz évről szóló összefoglaló jelentésének főbb megállapítása:

“Israel has no genuine investigation mechanism for complaints of torture. This results in absolute criminal immunity for interrogators who commit grave crimes. In practice the system enjoys the acquiescence and encouragement of the law enforcement system for torture that occurs in GSS interrogations”.

- 2009. december 29: az izraeli legfelsőbb bíróság az Abu Safiya v. Minister of Defence, HCJ 2150/07 döntése (angol összefoglaló) alapján a katonai parancsnoknak mindig a lehető legkisebb beavatkozással kell elérnie a biztonsági/katonai célját, így egy forgalmas közútról minden palesztin autó kizárása aránytalanak tekinthető.

- egy évvel a gázai háború után: az izraeli külügyminisztérium jelentése a gázaiak élethelyzetéről (a KüM kiadvány értékelését lásd itt és itt)

- október: Dr. Roy S. Schondorf vezetésével feláll az izraeli igazságügyminisztériumon belül az a jogi osztály, ami az izraeli tisztviselők ellen külföldön indított eljárásokat koordinálja.

Blackwater - Nisoor-tér, Irak - amerikai büntető-eljárásjog

Ricardo M. Urbina washingtoni szövetségi bíró január eleji döntésében elejtette a vádat öt Blackwater alkalmazottal szemben. A biztonsági cég Irakban az amerikai külügyminisztériummal állt szerződésben és biztosított konvojokat.

A vádindítvány (indictment) szerint, az egyik ilyen konvojt kísérő biztonsági őrök, 2007. szeptember 16-án tüzet nyitottak és megöltek több iraki civilt a bagdadi Nisoor téren. A lövöldözésben részt vett őrök még aznap írásos jelentést készítettek, majd a külügyminisztérium tisztségviselői többször kihallgatták őket. Amennyiben nem működtek volna együtt, úgy automatikusan elvesztették volna az állásukat. Az amerikai szövetségi jog alapján az ilyen kijelentések védettnek számítanak. Az ügyészség azonban a vádat pont ezeknek a “védett”, saját magukat inkrimináló, vallomások alapján (is) építette fel, ami olyan fokú eljárásjogi szabálysértés, ami alapján nem volt más lehetősége a bírónak, mint elejtenie a vádat (miscarriage of justice).

A döntés nagyon elegánsan lett megírva, elsőrangú olvasmány!

Nemzetközi büntetőjogi vonatkozásairól itt ír Schabas professzor.

Eltávozott a nemzetközi jog doyenje, Ian Brownlie

Az egyiptomi autóbalesetben elhunyt nemzetközi jogász-óriás nekrológja, Philippe Sands tollából, itt olvasható.

A ruandai népirtás nyitánya - ki lőtte le Habyarimana elnök gépét?

1994 április 6-án Habyarimana ruandai elnök gépének lelövése jelezte a katonai puccs és a 100 napos népirtás kezdetét. Az elmúlt másfél évtized során számos elemzés próbált fényt deríteni a merénylet hátterére, az elkövetők kilétére. Az ironikus módon a saját elnöki palotája kertjébe zuhanó repülőgépet, a ruandai kormány ún. Mutzinzi jelentése alapján a ruandai katonaság táborából érkező két föld-levegő rakéta találta el.

Az eddigi legaprólékosabb és a korábbi szakértői kutatások eredményeire is reflektáló, több száz oldalas dokumentum sokáig alapvető olvasmány lesz.

Vádirattól eltérő minősítás lehetősége a nemzetközi büntetőjogban

Kicsit hazabeszélnék: összehasonlító büntetőjoggal foglalkozó szakemberek figyelmébe ajánlom az ICC fellebbviteli tanácsa által a Lubanga ügyben hozott interlocutory appeal ítéletet: Judgment on the appeals of Mr Lubanga Dyilo and the Prosecutor against the Decision of Trial Chamber I of 14 July 2009 entitled "Decision giving notice to the parties and participants that the legal characterisation of the facts may be subject to change in accordance with Regulation 55(2) of the Regulations of the Court.

A fő téma a vádirattól eltérő minősítés lehetősége és annak feltételei.

Korábbi strasbourgi ítéletek kötelező ereje Nagy-Britanniában

Az előző posztban említetthez (mi tekinthető követendő jognak) kapcsolódik: a brit Lgfelsőbb Bíróság a R v Horncastle, [2009] UKSC 14 ügyben a brit Emberi Jogi Törvény (Section 2 of Human Rights Act 1998) azon rendelkezését értelmezte, amely szerint: “a court to ‘take into account’ any judgment of the Court of Human Rights in determining any question to which such judgment is relevant”.

A kérdés a körül forgott, hogy az ECtHR negyedik szekciója által hozott Al-Khawaja and Tahery v UK ügy a strasbourgi bíróság általános joggyakorlatának, vagy éppenséggel egy “renegát” ítéletnek tekinthető:

“Lord Phillips said that, although the requirement to ‘take into account’the Strasbourg jurisprudence would ‘normally result’ in the domestic court applying principles that are clearly established by the Strasbourg Court: ‘There will, however, be rare occasions where the domestic court has concerns as to whether a decision of the Strasbourg court sufficiently appreciates or accommodates particular aspects of our domestic process. In such circumstances, it is open to the domestic court to decline to follow the Strasbourg decision, giving reasons for adopting this course’”.

A Legfelsőbb Bíróság hosszan elemezte a strasbourgi bíróság Al-Khawaja előtti joggyakorlatát, és nem látta indokoltnak a ECtHR ítéletében foglaltakat követni.

A Horncastle ügy egyébként az anonim tanúvallomáso(ko)n alapuló elítélések Konvenció-konformitását vizsgálta.

Az olasz alkotmánybíróság Sentenza N. 311/2009 alatt hozott novemberi döntése épp ellenkezőleg az olasz alkotmánybíróság szupremáciáját fogalmazta meg a strasbourgi bírósággal szemben.

Ruandai törvényszék joggyakorlata - Human Rights Watch Digest 2010

A Human Right Watch lassan egy évtizede jelenteti meg az ad hoc bíróságok joggyakorlatát bemutató sorozatát. A ruandai nemzetközi törvényszék ügyeit rendszerező legújabb, 522 oldalas összeállításának megállapításait azonban mindig kellő óvatossággal kell kezelni: az ICTR előtt követendő jog mindig a fellebbviteli tanács határozataiban található; az ICTR elsőfokú tanácsai által hozott döntések, ítéletek eljárásjogi vagy szubsztantív nemzetközi büntetőjogi tartalmát így mindig csak a fellebbviteli döntések által kijelölt keretben szabad értelmezni.

Két új bíró a Nemzetközi Büntetőbíróságon

Ma délelőtt az ICC maanwegi épületében két új (női) bíró tette le a hivatali esküjét: az eseményen nagy számban képviseltették magukat a hágai diplomáciai testület tagjai, valamint a testvér bíróságok bírái.

OZAKI, Kuniko (életrajza itt) és FERNÁNDEZ DE GURMENDI, Silvia (életrajz innen letölthető) érkezésével 11-8 módosult a férfi-női bírák megoszlása.

Az argentin bírőnő korábban évekig az ICC ügyészi hivatalában dolgozott, így nagy érdeklődés kíséri a bírók ma délutáni plenáris ülését, itt fog ugyanis eldőlni, hogy melyik bírói szekcióba (előkészítő, elsőfokú vagy fellebvitlei tanács) fognak kerülni.

Hoffmann Tamás provokatív cikke Antonio Cassese-ről

Hoffmann Tamás, a veszprémi egyetem oktatója, neves külföldi szerzők társaságában (“Future Perspectives on International Criminal Justice” c. edited by Carsten Stahn and Larissa van den Herik) publikálta legújabb, provokatív cikkét: “The Gentle Humanizer of Humanitarian Law: Antonio Cassese and the Creation of the Customary Law of Non-International Armed Conflicts”, amely letölthető innen.

A könyvet egyébként jövő héten, itt Hágában, a német Kai Ambos professzor fogja bemutatni egy fogadás keretében.