European Court of Human Rights

FIFTH SECTION

DECISION

Applications nos. 8035/06, 8037/06, 8057/06, 1739/07 and 5509/07

by Ljiljana KONDIĆ and Others

against Slovenia

The European Court of Human Rights (Fifth Section), sitting on 7 June 2011 as a Committee composed of:

Boštjan M. Zupančič, President,
Ganna Yudkivska,
Angelika Nußberger, judges,
and Stephen Phillips, Deputy Section Registrar,

Having regard to the above applications,

Having regard to the Government’s settlement proposals made to the applicants,

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

THE FACTS

The applicants are Slovenian nationals.

The applicant Ms Ljiljana Kondić (application no. 8035/06) was born in 1979 and lives in Kranj. The applicant Mr Bojan Marguč (application no. 8037/06) was born in 1958 and lives in Celje. The applicant Mr Iztok Vovk (application no. 8057/06) was born in 1976 and lives in Vipava. The applicant Ms Seida HadZič (application no. 1739/07) was born in 1961 and lives in Kamnik. The applicant Ms Marjetka Jeraj (application no. 5509/07) was born in 1954 and lives in Vrhnika.

The applicants were represented before the Court by Mr Z. Lipej, a lawyer practising in Medvode.

The Slovenian Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent.

The applicants were parties to proceedings which were terminated before 1 January 2007, that is, before the 2006 Act on the Protection of the Right to a Trial without Undue Delay (“the 2006 Act”) became operational.

COMPLAINTS

The applicants complained under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention about the excessive length of civil proceedings and under Article 13 of the Convention about the lack of an effective domestic remedy in that regard.

THE LAW

In the present cases, the Court notes that, after the Government had been given notice of the applications, they informed the Court that they had made a settlement proposal to the applicants.

By the settlement agreements signed by the State Attorney’s Office and the applicants, the former acknowledged a violation of the right to a trial within a reasonable time and accepted to pay the applicants the non-pecuniary damage sustained and costs and expenses incurred. The applicants accepted the amount as a full compensation for the damage sustained due to the length of the above proceedings and waived any further claims against the Republic of Slovenia in respect of this complaint.

The applicants subsequently informed the Court that they had reached settlements with the State Attorney’s Office and that they wished to withdraw their applications introduced before the Court.

The Court takes note that following the settlements reached between the parties the matter has been resolved at the domestic level and that the applicants wish to withdraw their applications. It is satisfied that respect for human rights as defined in the Convention or its Protocols does not require the examination of the application to be continued (Article 37 § 1 in fine of the Convention).

In view of the above, it is appropriate to strike the cases out of the list in accordance with Article 37 § 1 (a) of the Convention.

For these reasons, the Court unanimously

Decides to join the applications;

Decides to strike the applications out of its list of cases.

Stephen Phillips Boštjan M. Zupančič Deputy Registrar President