The article demonstrates how references to Nazi and Soviet past are perceived and evaluated by the European Court of Human Rights. Individual cases concerning Holocaust and Nazism, which the Court has examined so far, are compared here to judgments rendered with regard to Communist regime. The article proves that the Court treats more leniently state interference with freedom of expression when memory about Nazism and Holocaust is protected than when a post–Communist state wants to preserve a critical memory about the regime. The authors of the article agree with the attitude of the Court which offers a wide margin of appreciation to states restrictively treating references to Nazism and Holocaust, including comparisons to the Holocaust, Nazism or fascism used as rhetorical devices. At the same time they postulate that other totalitarian systems should be treated by the Court equally. 

There is neither consensus whether the category of linguistic rights shall be distinguished, nor international agreement on the catalogue of such rights. Nevertheless, access to education in mother tongue constitutes a core element of most of the international and national frameworks of minority protection. Academic and legal disputes are particularly absorbing in Europe, where linguistic policies frequently intertwine with politics (e.g. Cyprus, Moldova, Ukraine). Thus, it is essential to pose the question, whether the right to education in mother tongue is always granted the equal scope of protection or is such protection differentiated by any additional criteria. Most of all, it shall be considered whether the analyzed right has an independent character or its protection is associated with perception of other fundamental rights and freedoms. This paper investigates the scope of the protection of this right within the framework of the Council of Europe.

Memory rights in the context of article 17 ECHR – right to negationism or negationism of the memory rights?

The objective of the article hereto is to present the mechanisms of the memory rights’ protection within the Strasbourg system, based upon the literal resonance of the European Convention of Human Rights and judicial practice of the European Court of Human Rights. Such topic will be subjected to analysis through the legal-dogmatic method which relies upon the construction of the concrete provisions of the Convention as well as jurisprudence of ECHR. The basic hypothesis of the author is the existence of the double standards of memory rights’ protection against negationism, depending from the type of denied memory right.

The Permissibility of Ex Lege Termination of the Term of Office of the Judicial Members of the National Council of the Judiciary in its Composition Resulting from the Act of 8 December 2017, in the Light of the Case Law of the European Court of Human Rights

The article analyzes the permissibility of terminating the terms of office of current members of the National Judiciary Council without providing them with access to court from the perspective of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights. The starting point is the judgment of the ECtHR in the case of Grzęda v. Poland, in which it was found that the ex lege termination of the terms of office of the NCJ members in 2018 violated Art. 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights. However, the interpretation of the ECHR cannot disregard the specific context related to the lack of independence of the current NCJ and its negative impact on the integrity of the judicial appointment process. These circumstances justify the conclusion that Art. 6 ECHR would not protect the current members of the NCJ from the termination of their terms of office.