European Court of Human Rights grants Romania extra month for property restitution measures

The European Court of Human Right (ECHR) has granted the Romanian government's request to extend the deadline to take measures capable of providing adequate redress for those whose assets or properties were confiscated by Communist regime pre-1989. The one month extension is the second the ECHR has given Romania, after a nine-month extension the Court requested in April last year and approved in June.

Following a pilot judgment in the Maria Atanasiu and Others versus Romania case, delivered on October 12 2010, the ECHR ruled that Romania would have to put general measures in place for restitution claims. Those measures were to be adopted within 18 months from the date on which the judgment became final - January 12, 2011. According to the ECHR, the original deadline and extension took into account the difficulties the Romanian authorities encountered when trying to implement restitution measures, but the new extension was none-the-less granted on the grounds that it is only a month extra and that the government has decided to consult the committee of ministers on the issue. News recently broke about Romania’s new plan to create an extra National Fund that would include agricultural land and forest, which would be given to former owners who failed to be compensated via the Fondul Proprietatea, which had been created for this purpose. The Association of Former Property Owners said they were not consulted when this new project was drafted, despite the ECHR having requested a consultation process. Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta said that during his recent talks with the Secretary General of the Council of Europe Thorbjørn Jagland, the two decided the best solution is to have a talk about the exact text of the law prior to its enforcement, and if objections will be raised, they will be addressed in the law. This is the reason for the three week to a month requested delay, said the PM. Government representatives will also go to Strasbourg in April and talk to the European Court specialists prior to the new law being approved. He has previously said the Government wanted to assume responsibility on this piece of legislation. Romania has lost 435 cases at the ECHR concerning properties confiscated during the Communist regime, for breaching Article 1 in protocol 1 of the Convention on Human Rights, which protects property rights. Over 200,000 property restitution files are currently awaiting a solution in Romania. We wrote about the new proposed system for property restitution here. editor@romania-insider.com