Page 48 - Report on the infringement of rights and guarantees of attorneys in Ukraine

USING INTERNATIONAL MECHANISMS FOR THE PROTECTION
OF ATTORNEYS’ RIGHTS

Applying to Third UN Special Rapporteur
the European Court party on the Independence
of Human Rights intervention of Judges and Lawyers

informing about violations of the opportunity to draw the a specially created
the Convention for the ECHR’s attention to the international instrument to
Protection of Human Rights negative trends in the sphere counteract violations against
and Fundamental Freedoms of human rights violations judges and attorneys
by Member States of the
Council of Europe

LODGING APPLICATIONS WITH THE ECHR

The binding nature of ECHR judgments for all Council of Europe countries, including
Ukraine, is especially important. It allows those whose rights were violated to lodge an
application with a structure beyond the jurisdiction of a particular state and to expect its
judgments to be complied with by national authorities. Such an application is usually
lodged by the injured person , but various associations, such as non-governmental
organisations, academic community and other actors, may participate in this process.
Despite the large number of major offences against attorneys , superficial analysis of
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ECHR judgments reflects a relatively small number of cases regarding direct violations of
the rights of advocacy representatives. Such a situation may indicate that the ECHR has no
information about the current state of advocacy in Ukraine, thus making the measures on
informing the European Court even more relevant.

THIRD PARTY INTERVENTION

When associations participate as an applicant, it is called "third party intervention". It
allows Bar self-government initiative groups and civil society groups working with the
problem of violations of attorneys rights to take an active part in preparing for the
submission and consideration by the ECHR of complaints about negative trends that are
present in the exercise by advocacy representatives of their rights.
Such a format enables the ECHR to obtain additional information on materials to which it
would otherwise not actually have access due to the lack of ability to process large
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volumes of data (including the legal aspects of national legislation of dozens of countries,
previous court decisions that may relate to a case, etc.). At the same time, it is important
to provide the ECHR with information on the judicial practice of domestic courts, which will
help to better understand the negative trends of Ukrainian realities, evaluate the
efficiency of the domestic judicial system in the area of solving offences committed
against attorneys.

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