Koptova v. Slovakia
From DADEL
Case Summary
Koptova v. Slovakia
Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination
Communication No 13/1998: Slovakia. 01/11/2000
CERD/C/57/D/13/1998
The author of the communication is Anna Koptova, a Slovak citizen of Romany ethnicity. She is the director of the Legal Defense Bureau for Ethnic Minorities of the Good Romany Fairy Kesaj Foundation in Kosice and claims to be a victim of violations by the Slovak Republic of Articles 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination ("Convention”).
Contents |
Facts
In 1981, seven Romany families came to work in an agricultural cooperative and received permanent residence in the municipality of Krasny Brod (currently Rokytovce and Nagov). When the agricultural cooperative ceased operations at the end of 1989, the Romany families lost their jobs and were compelled to leave the cooperative. In May 1991, the Romany families returned to the municipalities where they were legally registered, i.e. Rokytovce and Nagov. Although the families raised sufficient money to do so, no village allowed them to place the trailer on its territory. On 21 July 1997, dwellings built and occupied by the Romany families in the municipality of Cabiny were set on fire. No perpetrator was identified.
On 8 June 1997, the Municipal Council of Rokytovce enacted a resolution which expressly forbade the Romany families from settling in the village and threatened them with expulsion should they try to settle there. On 16 July 1997, the Municipality of Nagov adopted resolution No. 22, which also forbade Roma citizens to enter the village or to settle in shelters in the village district. The Kosice Legal Defence Foundation sent a letter to the General Prosecutor's Office in Bratislava requesting an investigation into the legality of Resolutions No. 21 and No. 22.
On 24 November 1997, the Kosice Legal Defence Foundation submitted an application to the Constitutional Court of the Slovak Republic requesting annulment of both resolutions. In its decision of 18 December 1997, the Constitutional Court dismissed the submission on the ground that, as a legal person, the Kosice Legal Defense Foundation could not suffer an infringement of the constitutional rights set forth in its application, since those rights were designed to protect only natural persons.
On 5 May 1998, Ms. Koptova, together with Miroslav Lacko (another employee of the Kosice Legal Defence Foundation) and Jan Lacko, one of the Romany citizens whose dwellings were destroyed on 21 July 1997, filed another submission before the Constitutional Court. This submission challenged the Nagov resolution on the grounds that it unlawfully restricted the freedom of movement and residence of a group of people solely because they were Roma. On 16 June 1998, the Constitutional Court issued an opinion dismissing the petition.
On 8 April 1999, the Municipal Council of Nagov and the Municipal Council of Rokytovce held extraordinary meetings, also attended by the District Prosecutor, and decided to revoke resolution No. 22 and resolution No. 21, respectively.
Admissibility
The Committee noted that notwithstanding their abrogation, the resolutions had remained in force from July 1997 to April 1999. Accordingly, the Committee had to examine whether during that time violations of the Convention had taken place as a result of their enactment. Neither the Convention nor the rules of procedure prevented the Committee from examining a case that was also being considered by the European Court of Human Rights. The Committee was of the view, contrary to the State party, that Ms. Koptova could be considered a "victim" within the meaning of Article 14, paragraph 1, of the Convention, since she belonged to the population directly targeted by the resolutions in question. Finally, the Committee deemed the municipal councils, which had adopted the resolutions, to be public authorities for the purposes of the implementation of the Convention.
Merits
The Committee found that, although the wording of resolutions 21 and 22 refers explicitly to Romas previously domiciled in the concerned municipalities, other Romas would have been equally prohibited from settling, which represented a violation of Article 5 (d) (i) of the Convention. The Committee noted, however, that the resolutions in question were rescinded in April 1999.
Decision
The Committee recommended that the State party take the necessary measures to ensure that practices restricting the freedom of movement and residence of Romas under its jurisdiction are fully and promptly eliminated.