issued by the Registrar of the Court

ECHR 212 (2018)

12.06.2018

Violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1: annulment of property rights to land

covered by forests of national importance

In today’s Chamber judgment¹in the case of Beinarovič and Others v. Lithuania (application

nos. 70520/10, 21920/10 and 41876/11) the European Court of Human Rights held, unanimously,

that there had been:

a violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (protection of property) to the European Convention on

Human Rights in respect of the first, second and third applicants, but no violation of this Article in

respect of the fourth applicant.

The case concerned the annulment of property rights to plots of land on the grounds that the plots

were covered by forests of national importance.

The Court found in particular that the annulment in itself did not constitute a violation of the

applicants’ rights under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 as the domestic authorities were entitled to

correct their mistakes. However, expecting the applicants to undergo a lengthy additional restitution

process, without having regard to their particular situation, had been disproportionate.

Principal facts

The applicants, Bronislava Beinarovič, Janina Kšivanskienė, Monika Korkuc and Sabina Dviliova are

Lithuanian nationals. Ms Beinarovič was born in 1915 and lived in Vilnius, she died in 2015. Her

daughter and heir Ms Kšivanskienė, the second applicant, was born in 1943, and Ms Dviliova, the

fourth applicant, was born in 1950. Both live in Vilnius. Ms Korkuc, the third applicant, was born in

1932 and lives in Pagiriai (Vilnius Region).

On various dates in 1991 the applicants or their relatives applied for restoration of their property

rights to land which had been nationalised by the Soviet regime. Between 1992 and 1998 the

domestic courts or the domestic authorities acknowledged that the applicants had a right to have

property rights to plots of land restored, in particular in Kryžiokai and Vaidotai, areas near Vilnius.

Consequently, between May 2003 and April 2004, the Vilnius County Administration (“the VCA”)

restored the property rights according to their applications.

However, in subsequent proceedings, the domestic courts annulled these property right decisions on

the grounds that the plots were covered by urban forests which, according to domestic law, were

forests of national importance. The applicants contested the annulment before the domestic courts,

but were unsuccessful.

The applicants were informed that after the courts had annulled their property rights, they had

retained the rights to have them restored in one of the ways provided by law. Subsequent

restitution proceedings started in 2010 (for the first, second and third applicant) and in 2012 (for the

fourth applicant), but their property rights have still not been fully restored to this day.

1. Under Articles 43 and 44 of the Convention, this Chamber judgment is not final. During the three-month period following its delivery,

any party may request that the case be referred to the Grand Chamber of the Court. If such a request is made, a panel of five judges

considers whether the case deserves further examination. In that event, the Grand Chamber will hear the case and deliver a final

judgment. If the referral request is refused, the Chamber judgment will become final on that day.

Once a judgment becomes final, it is transmitted to the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe for supervision of its execution.

Further information about the execution process can be found here: www.coe.int/t/dghl/monitoring/execution.

Complaints, procedure and composition of the Court

Relying on Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention, the applicants alleged in particular that the

annulment of their property rights was unlawful, since the land concerned had always been a rural

area and thus could not contain urban forests. They also submitted that there were no forests on the

land when their property rights were restored, and that forest which had grown there later should

not preclude that restoration.

They further complained about long delays and the inactivity of the authorities in the restitution

proceedings, which had led to a failure to this day to restore their property rights.

The applications were lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 15 November 2010 (by

the first two applicants), 2 April 2010 (by the third applicant) and 30 May 2011 (by the fourth

applicant).

Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:

Ganna Yudkivska (Ukraine), President,

Vincent A. De Gaetano (Malta),

Paulo Pinto de Albuquerque (Portugal),

Egidijus Kūris (Lithuania),

Iulia Motoc (Romania),

Carlo Ranzoni (Liechtenstein),

Péter Paczolay (Hungary),

and also Marialena Tsirli, Section Registrar.

Decision of the Court

Article 1 of Protocol No. 1

The Court found that the annulment of property rights in itself did not constitute a violation of the

applicants’ rights since the Lithuanian authorities were entitled to correct their mistakes in order to

protect forests classified as being of national importance. However, it emphasised that, in line with

its established case-law, the applicants, who had obtained their property in good faith, should not

have had to bear the burden of remedying mistakes for which the authorities were solely

responsible.

Consequently, the Court concluded that there had been a violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 in

respect of Ms Beinarovič, Ms Kšivanskienė and Ms Korkuc, in view of the excessive length of the

restitution processes, imputable solely or mainly to the authorities, and the fact that their property

rights had still not been fully restored.

The Court considered that the authorities had been under an obligation to proceed promptly with

the restitution of their property rights since the applicants had already gone through that process

once and had lost their property because of the authorities’ mistakes. Nevertheless, the applicants’

individual situation was not taken into account at any stage.

In contrast, the delay in the restitution process which had affected Ms Dviliova (the fourth applicant)

had not been caused by the authorities. She had explicitly refused to participate in the restitution

process as she wished to wait for the Court’s decision in her case. The Court reiterated that within

the scheme of the Convention it was intended to be subsidiary to the national systems safeguarding

human rights. Since the domestic authorities could not be held responsible for the delay in her case,

the Court found no violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1.