The EU Principle of Mutual Recognition Before the European Court of Human Rights

Summary

1. INTRODUCTION

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has elaborated obligations both for the enforcement of judgments in situations where adjudication of the dispute and implementation of the judgment occur in the same national legal system, and for the recognition or enforcement of foreign judgments (see section 2 below). As all EU Member States have ratified the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR or Convention), they are obliged to secure the ECHR’s rights and freedoms. Meanwhile, in the European Union (EU), recognition and enforcement of judgments from one Member State in another Member State is, for the most part, no longer a matter of national law. The Treaty of Amsterdam 3 vested judicial cooperation in civil matters within the competence of the EU 4 (today this matter is governed by Art. 81 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU)). Since then, the unification and simplification of the recognition and enforcement procedures has developed steadily (see section 3 below). However, it is not obvious whether, and to what extent, the recognition and enforcement of a judgment in accordance with an EU regulation will be measured against rights embodied in the Convention (see section 4 below). First, the EU is not yet a party to the Convention, even though it may ultimately accede to it. The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) gave a negative opinion 6 on the draft Accession Agreement of 5 April 2013, and the renegotiation of the Accession Agreement, which started in October 2019, has not yet come to an end. Thus, the ECHR does not bind the EU directly. Second, the EU Member States are committed in two different ways: as Contracting States to the ECHR, and as EU Member States vis-à-vis the EU.

2. THE IMPACT OF FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS ON THE IMPLEMENTATION OF JUDGMENTS

2.1. NATIONAL DIMENSION

According to Art. 6(1) ECHR, ‘[i]n the determination of his civil rights and obligations … everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law.’ On the one hand, this provision implicitly guarantees the right of access to a court.