ECHR rules against Turkish Muslim parents who objected sending children to mixed swimming lessons.

ECHR rules against Turkish Muslim parents who objected sending children to mixed swimming lessons. (Telegraph).

Muslims girls in Switzerland must not be exempt from mixed swimming lessons, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has said, in a potentially groundbreaking ruling.

The court in Strasbourg threw out an appeal that had been brought by a Muslim couple who said they should be allowed to let their daughters sit out swimming lessons with boys.

It was not a violation of the pupils' human rights to make them take part in mixed swimming lessons, the court ruled, adding that schools has a "special role" in integrating young children, especially those from foreign backgrounds. 

"The children's interest in a full education, thus facilitating their successful social integration according to local customs and mores, prevailed over the parents' wish to have their children exempted from mixed swimming lessons," the ECHR said in its ruling.

The couple, who are of Turkish origin,  had appealed after being fined for  keeping their daughters out of mixed-gender, mandatory public-school swimming lessons for reasons linked to their Muslim faith.

They were both "fervent practitioners of the Muslim religion," the ECHR said. Read the full story here.

Armenian Church appeals to the European Court for Human Rights against Turkey for the failure to return some properties of Sis.

Armenian Church appeals to the European Court for Human Rights (ECHR) against Turkey for the failure to return some properties of Sis. (Fides).

Aram I, Armenian Apostolic Catholicos of the Great House of Cilicia, in Antelias, Lebanon, announced that today, December 6, the request for the return of the ancient residences and properties belonging to the Catholicosate and located in Sis, in Turkish territory, will be submitted to the European Court for Human Rights - based in Strasbourg - after the Constitutional Court of Turkey did not accept the request to discuss and resolve the dispute on the properties of Sis within the Turkish legal system .

"This - remarked Catholicos Aram I in the video message in which he announced the initiative - is the first legal action taken against Turkey after the Armenian Genocide of 1915, is the result of long and serious discussions, studies and consultations, and is based on international legal provisions, including the decisions of the Treaty of Lausanne of 1932, regarding the minorities living within the boundaries of the Turkish Republic".

The cause to obtain the restitution of the Catholicosate’s historic buildings located in the city of Sis, started by Catholicos Aram I in 2015, had not been taken into account neither by the Turkish Ministry of Justice nor by the Turkish Constitutional Court. Both Turkish institutions had not recognized any legal basis to the cause.

Sis, the ancient capital of the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia, corresponds to the current Turkish town of Kozan. The intention to appeal, in April 2015, had already been announced on several occasions by the Catholicos of Cilicia between September and October 2014.

"We cannot remain apathetic with regards to the violated rights of our nation", said Aram on September 19, 2015 in Yerevan, on the occasion of the 5th Conference of the Armenian Diaspora. As already reported by Agenzia Fides (see Fides 01/10/2014), the Catholicos himself had predicted that, in the event that the Turkish institutions would take the matter into consideration, the appeal would be submitted to the European Court of Human Rights.

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Report by UK lawmakers and legal experts finds ample evidence of Turkey’s breach of ECHR.

Report by UK lawmakers and legal experts finds ample evidence of Turkey’s breach of ECHR. HT: TodaysZaman.


A report prepared by UK lawmakers and legal experts upon the request of the Turkish Journalists and Writers Foundation (GYV) that they investigate violations of the rule of law and persecutions targeting the Gülen movement concluded that there is ample evidence to establish breaches of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and other treaties to which Turkey is a party.

During a discussion on Thursday of the findings of the report, which was prepared by the Rt. Hon. Lord Harry Woolf CH, Professor Sir Jeffrey Jowell KCMG QC, the Rt. Hon. Sir Edward Garnier QC MP and Sarah Palin, a practicing barrister in London, GYV representative Fatih Ceran said the authors of the report consider the witch hunts and other illegal actions targeting institutions affiliated with the Gülen movement, also known as the Hizmet movement, to be cases of discrimination, according to the ECHR.

Summarizing breaches of human rights and the rule of law in Turkey, which have targeted the Gülen movement in particular since December 2013, the approximately 100-page report stated that these violations “represent a serious setback for Turkish democracy and its respect for human rights.”

The authors of the report stress that they were asked by the GYV to conduct an independent desk-based inquiry into the actions of the Turkish government, its institutions and its officials against supporters of the Gülen movement. Read the full story here.

Related: 'Advanced Islamist Democracy' Turkey preparing to target the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).

ECHR: " Israel does not occupy Gaza "

European Court of Human Rights determines that Israel does not occupy Gaza. HT: CarlinJerusalem (ISRAEL).


The European Court of Human Rights has determined that Israel is not occupying Gaza (Hat Tip: Daled Amos).

Yesterday the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights delivered judgments in two blockbuster cases regarding the aftermath of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan: Chiragov and Others v. Armenia and Sargsyan v. Azerbaijan. These are very rich judgments raising many important issues, and I will be writing up more detailed comments shortly. But I first had to share one particular little nugget: the Court has (implicitly!) decided that Israel is not the occupying power in Gaza. How so, you ask?

Both cases dealt with applications by persons displaced by the conflict who are not able to access their property in the affected areas. The Sargsyan case in particular dealt with the the denial of the applicant’s right to return to the village of Gulistan. The village is located on the territory of Azerbaijan, but very close or on the so-called line of contact between Azerbaijan and the forces of the separatist Nagorno-Karabakh republic. Thus, in the view of the Azerbaijani government, the village was not under the control of Azerbaijan, and was moreover mined and inaccessible to any civilian.

Note the reference to the concept of belligerent occupation. Immediately after this paragraph, the Court makes the following observations, under the heading ‘relevant international law’ (para. 94):

Article 42 of the Regulations concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land, The Hague, 18 October 1907 (hereafter “the 1907 Hague Regulations”) defines belligerent occupation as follows: “Territory is considered occupied when it is actually placed under the authority of the hostile army. The occupation extends only to the territory where such authority has been established and can be exercised.” Accordingly, occupation within the meaning of the 1907 Hague Regulations exists when a state exercises actual authority over the territory, or part of the territory, of an enemy state(1) . The requirement of actual authority is widely considered to be synonymous to that of effective control.

Military occupation is considered to exist in a territory, or part of a territory, if the following elements can be demonstrated: the presence of foreign troops, which are in a position to exercise effective control without the consent of the sovereign. According to widespread expert opinion physical presence of foreign troops is a sine qua non requirement of occupation(2) , i.e. occupation is not conceivable without “boots on the ground” therefore forces exercising naval or air control through a naval or air blockade do not suffice(3) .

Now, it almost goes without saying that the Court was not discussing Gaza. It was discussing an area called Gulistan on the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan. But....

In para. 95 the Court then proceeds to cite the ICRC Customary IHL Study as well as Article 49 GC IV regarding rights of displaced persons. (The same text can be found in paras. 96-97 of the Chiragov judgment). But the really important bit happens in paras. 143-144 of Sargsyan: 143. At this point the Court considers it useful to reiterate that Azerbaijan has deposited a declaration with its instrument of ratification expressing that it was “unable to guarantee the application of the provisions of the Convention in the territories occupied by the Republic of Armenia” (see paragraph 93 above). In its decision on the admissibility of the present case, the Court has held that the declaration was not capable of restricting the territorial application of the Convention to certain parts of the internationally recognised territory of Azerbaijan (Sargsyan (dec.), cited above, §§ 63-65) nor did it fulfil the requirements of a valid reservation (ibid., §§ 66-70).

144. The Court notes that under international law (in particular Article 42 of the 1907 Hague Regulations) a territory is considered occupied when it is actually placed under the authority of a hostile army, “actual authority” being widely considered as translating to effective control and requiring such elements as presence of foreign troops, which are in a position to exercise effective control without the consent of the sovereign (see paragraph 94 above). On the basis of all the material before it and having regard to the above establishment of facts, the Court finds that Gulistan is not occupied by or under the effective control of foreign forces as this would require a presence of foreign troops in Gulistan.

See what I meant? Replace “Gulistan” with “Gaza”, and there you have it! In fact, I’m pretty sure that this is at least one judgment of the European Court that Israeli governmental legal advisors will be citing all the time, whenever the issue of Gaza’s occupation is brought up (and good for them). Read the full story here.