EIT:n roolista kiivasta keskustelua Britanniassa

Britanniassa on viime aikoina käyty kiivasta keskustelua EIT:n roolista, ja kritisoitu sen liian suurta valtaa suhteessa kansallisiin tuomioistuimiin. EIT:n brittiläinen presidentti torjuu kritiikin.

Pääministeri David Cameron varoitti, että EIT:sta näyttää tulevan "rikkomuksia" käsittelevä tuomioistuin, joka ei kykene käsittelemään vakavia ihmisoikeusloukkauksia, ellei se tee muutoksia toiminnassaan. Cameron totesi seuraavaa:

"The court should be free to deal with the most serious violations of human rights; it should not be swamped with an endless backlog of cases. The court should ensure that the right to individual petition counts; it should not act as a small claims court. And the court should hold us all to account; it should not undermine its own reputation by going over national decisions where it does not need to. For the sake of the 800 million people the court serves, we need to reform it so that it is true to its original purpose."

The Guardianin artikkelissa jatketaan:

The UK government privately believes the court should spend less time focusing on countries such as Britain, France and Germany, which have well-regarded legal systems and a strong record on human rights, and more time focusing on countries such as Russia and Ukraine with less impressive records. Russia accounts for 26.6% of the backlog at the court. Cameron contrasts Britain's record with other Council of Europe member states, which face cases over extrajudicial killings and torture.

EIT:n presidentti, Sir Nicolas Braza, vastasi kritiikkiin The Independentissä:

Sir Nicolas also hits back at the Government's accusation that the court interferes too often in domestic cases, saying: "The criticism relating to interference is simply not borne out by the facts."

The Strasbourg court has been "particularly respectful of decisions" in Britain since the Human Rights Act, which enshrined the Convention in British law, because of the "very high quality of those decisions", he says. Sir Nicolas says the court has streamlined its procedures to help it deal with "repetitive cases".

He says: "Against this background, it is disappointing to hear senior British politicians lending their voices to criticisms more frequently heard in the popular press, often based on a misunderstanding of the court's role and history, and of the legal issues at stake.

"It is particularly unfortunate that a single judgment of the court on a case relating to UK prisoners' voting rights, which was delivered in 2005 and has still not been implemented, has been used as the springboard for a sustained attack on the court and has led to repeated calls for the granting of powers of Parliament to override judgments of the court against the UK, and even for the withdrawal of the UK from the Convention."

Lisätietoa:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/law/2012/jan/25/david-cameron-reform-european-court

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/europes-top-judge-cameron-is-wrong-about-human-rights-6293668.html

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