Decisions

European Court of Human Rights December 4, 2025 Third country: Belarus. The applicants complained that the Polish authorities ignored their requests for international protection and “pushed them back to the Belarusian side of the border”.

Disposition The Court took note of the friendly settlement and decided unanimously “to strike the applications out of its list of cases in accordance with Article 39 of the Convention”. Poland undertook to pay EUR 20,000 “jointly to the five applicants, who form one household”, and the applicants agreed “to waive any further claims against Poland in respect of the facts giving rise to these applications”. The decision was notified in writing on 8 January 2026.

The applicants complained under Articles 2 and 3, alone and with Article 13, “that the Polish authorities had ignored their requests for international protection and that, instead, they had pushed them back to the Belarusian side of the border. As the Belarusian authorities forced them back towards the Polish side, the applicants were stranded in the border forest area without access to medical aid, food, water, and shelter and in harsh weather conditions including frequent rains and low temperatures.” Their further complaints included detention under Article 5, Article 8 and collective expulsion under Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 (appended table). The parties signed friendly-settlement declarations, which the Court received in February 2025 (appended table). The Court was “satisfied that the settlement is based on respect for human rights as defined in the Convention and its Protocols” and struck the applications out.

Pushbacks Access to asylum Friendly settlement Article 3 ECHR Collective expulsion Detention

Caution A friendly settlement is not a finding of a violation, and the decision makes no finding of fact; the account of events is the applicants’ complaint, and the decision does not date the events. The summary returns at the Belarusian border from the summer of 2021 are before the Grand Chamber in A.R. and Others v. Poland, to be ruled on 24 November 2026.

European Court of Human Rights May 20, 2025 Third country: Libya. Two of the applicants, R.J. and E.R.O., remained on the Libyan ship Ras Jadir; they said the crew bound them with ropes, beat and threatened them, and that they were taken to a detention camp in Tajura, Libya, where they were ill-treated. They were later returned to Nigeria under the voluntary humanitarian return programme run by the IOM (paragraph 15). The other fifteen were taken to Italy by the rescue ship Sea-Watch 3 (paragraph 16).

Disposition Unanimously, the Court decided “to strike the application out of its list of cases in so far as it concerns the applicants I.A., E.E.A., E.K., V.M and J.O.”, with whom their representatives had lost contact (paragraph 17), and declared “the remainder of the application inadmissible”. It held that “the applicants were not under the jurisdiction of Italy within the meaning of Article 1 of the Convention in respect of the facts complained of under Articles 2, 3 and 4 of the Convention and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4” (paragraph 114). The decision was notified in writing on 12 June 2025.

At 6.15 a.m. on 6 November 2017 the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre in Rome received a distress signal from the dinghy, thirty-three nautical miles north of Tripoli; the coordination centre in Tripoli instructed the Libyan ship Ras Jadir to direct the rescue (paragraphs 5 to 8). According to the applicants, the Libyan ship’s manoeuvres caused the death of several people, who were flung into the water, and its crew struck those in the water with ropes and threatened them with weapons; Sea-Watch 3 pulled dozens aboard and recovered the dead, among them the sons of S.S. and R.J. (paragraphs 11 and 13). The Court found that Italy did not control the area: its support to Libya under the 2017 agreements, which included vessels such as the Ras Jadir, did not mean that “the international maritime area off the Libyan coast was under the effective control and decisive influence of Italy” (paragraphs 94 and 97). Nor did Italian agents control the applicants: “none of the ships involved in the rescue operation was flying the Italian flag or was under the de facto control of Italian agents” (paragraph 101), and “the mere fact that the search and rescue procedure was initiated by the Rome MRCC cannot have resulted in bringing the applicants under the jurisdiction of the Italian State” (paragraph 106). The Court added that “all the reports in its possession from international bodies and NGOs demonstrate that, at the material time, asylum-seekers, refugees and migrants in Libya were at risk of torture, slavery and discrimination, such that the situation in that country was no more favourable than it was found to have been in the Hirsi Jamaa and Others case” (paragraph 109), and that “problems with managing migratory flows cannot justify having recourse to practices which are incompatible with their obligations under the Convention” (paragraph 111).

Pushbacks Extraterritorial jurisdiction Search and rescue Bilateral agreements Outsourcing of migration control Article 3 ECHR

Caution The decision turns on jurisdiction and does not decide whether the events breached the Convention; the facts are as the applicants submitted them (paragraph 3). It distinguishes Hirsi Jamaa and Others v. Italy (see that entry), where the applicants were on Italian military ships. The Court said that the situation “is nonetheless governed by other rules of international law, in particular those regarding the rescue of persons at sea, the protection of refugees and State responsibility” (paragraph 112). The decision was adopted in French; this entry quotes the English text on HUDOC.

European Court of Human Rights April 4, 2024 Third country: Ukraine. From December 2016 to January 2017 border guards at Medyka and another crossing on the Polish-Ukrainian border turned each of them away to Ukraine at least four times, and one of them fourteen times (paragraph 5); on 1 February 2017 all four were sent back again (paragraphs 9 and 10). The Court noted that Ukraine was “a Contracting Party to the Convention” (paragraph 47).

Disposition Unanimously: the applications joined and declared admissible; “a violation of the procedural limb of Article 3 of the Convention”; a violation of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; a violation of Article 13 taken with Article 3 and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; and no need to examine the complaint under Article 8 in application no. 54255/17. EUR 13,000 to each applicant for non-pecuniary damage; the remainder of the claims dismissed. The judgment became final on 4 July 2024.

The four men said they asked each time for international protection “because they were at risk of political persecution in Tajikistan” (paragraph 5). On 1 February 2017 all four presented themselves at Medyka and asked to apply; a lawyer from the Helsinki Foundation, who had written authority from two of them, asked to attend their interviews and was refused (paragraph 9). The border guards recorded economic and personal reasons, and all four were sent back to Ukraine (paragraph 10). The Polish administrative courts later found that the border guards had not properly established whether the men wished to apply. The Supreme Administrative Court held on 20 September 2018 that “the official notes could not have been considered sufficient evidence of the applicants’ intentions as expressed at the border” (paragraphs 17, 19 and 20). The European Court observed that those findings “did not result in any change of the applicants’ situation, given that the appeal to those courts did not have automatic suspensive effect” (paragraph 49). That Ukraine was a party to the Convention “did not exempt the Polish authorities from conducting a thorough examination of the applicants’ situation” (paragraph 48). Poland “should either have allowed the applicants to remain in Polish territory pending the examination of their asylum application or, before sending them back to Ukraine, they should have examined whether that State was safe for the applicants and whether they would have access to an adequate asylum procedure there” (paragraph 48). Sending them back without that examination “constituted a violation of the procedural limb of that Article” (paragraph 50).

Access to asylum Pushbacks Safe third country Collective expulsion Effective remedy Article 3 ECHR Access to a lawyer

Caution The violation is of the procedural limb of Article 3: Poland did not examine whether Ukraine was safe for the applicants before sending them there. The Court did not find that Ukraine was unsafe for them or that they were ill-treated there. The judgment lists one applicant as living in Warsaw, two in Austria and one in Ukraine (appended table).

European Court of Human Rights October 13, 2022 Third country: Belarus. Between August 2016 and April 2017 the family went to the crossing at Terespol on twenty-two occasions and then three more times with a written application for international protection, and was each time sent back to Belarus (paragraphs 2 to 4).

Disposition Unanimously: the application admissible; a violation of Article 3; and violations of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 and of Article 13 taken with Article 3 and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 “as regards the other complaints raised under the well-established case-law of the Court”. EUR 28,000 to the applicants jointly for pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage and EUR 480 for costs and expenses; the remainder of the claim dismissed. As a Committee judgment it was final when delivered.

The Court recorded: “At 10.05 a.m. on 13 June 2017 the Court (the duty judge) decided to apply Rule 39, indicating to the Polish Government that the applicants should not be removed to Belarus until 27 June 2017. The Government were informed of the interim measure before the planned time of the expulsion. Nevertheless, the applicants were returned to Belarus at 11.25 a.m.” (paragraph 6). On 19 June 2017 they came back with an application and a copy of the Court’s letter and were allowed to enter Poland (paragraph 7). Following M.K. and Others v. Poland, the Committee held that “the fact that no proceedings in which the applicants’ applications for international protection could be reviewed had been initiated when the applicants were at the Polish border crossing constituted a violation of Article 3 of the Convention”, and that the authorities “knowingly exposed them to a serious risk of chain refoulement and treatment prohibited by Article 3 of the Convention” (paragraph 19). It found the other violations “in the light of its findings in previous judgments” (paragraph 21). It rejected the Government’s argument that the family should have appealed against the refusals of entry: such an appeal had no suspensive effect and could not have prevented their return to Belarus (paragraphs 12 to 15).

Access to asylum Pushbacks Chain refoulement Collective expulsion Effective remedy Interim measures Article 3 ECHR

Caution A three-judge Committee decided the case under the Court’s well-established case law. After the applicants were admitted to Poland, the head of the Aliens Office refused them international protection on 20 April 2018 and the Refugee Board upheld the refusal on 2 October 2019 (paragraph 10); the judgment does not record what happened to them after that. Their complaints did not include Article 34 (paragraph 11), so the judgment makes no finding on the interim measure. Like M.K. and Others v. Poland (see that entry), the judgment concerns an official border crossing in 2016 and 2017. It does not decide the summary returns at the Belarusian border from the summer of 2021, which are before the Grand Chamber in A.R. and Others v. Poland, to be ruled on 24 November 2026.

European Court of Human Rights June 30, 2022 Third country: Belarus. Border guards at Terespol turned the family away to Belarus sixteen times between October 2016 and June 2017 (paragraphs 6, 11, 13, 15 and 45). On 25 May 2017 the Belarusian authorities told them that “they had to leave Belarus by 4 June 2017, otherwise they would face deportation” (paragraph 12).

Disposition Unanimously: the application admissible; violations of Article 3, of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4, and of Article 13 taken with Article 3 and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4. EUR 28,000 to the applicants jointly for pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage and EUR 750 for costs and expenses; the remainder of the claim dismissed. The judgment became final on 14 November 2022.

The family went to the crossing at Terespol thirteen times in October and November 2016, and again in March and May 2017 with a written application for international protection (paragraphs 6, 11 and 13). Each time the border guards issued decisions turning them away, recording that they had not said they were at risk of persecution but were trying to emigrate for economic or personal reasons (paragraph 9). The Court recorded: “At 10.10 a.m. on 2 June 2017 the Court (the duty judge) decided to apply Rule 39 of the Rules of Court, indicating to the Polish Government that the applicants should not be removed to Belarus until 16 June 2017. The Government were informed of the interim measure before the planned time of expulsion. Nevertheless, the applicants were returned to Belarus at 11.25 a.m.” (paragraph 15). They came back that afternoon with an application for international protection and a copy of the Court’s letter, and were allowed to enter Poland (paragraph 16). The Court held: “The fact that no proceedings in which the applicants’ applications for international protection could be reviewed were initiated on the sixteen occasions when the applicants were at the Polish border crossing constituted a violation of Article 3 of the Convention”; the Polish authorities “knowingly exposed them to a serious risk of chain refoulement and treatment prohibited by Article 3 of the Convention” (paragraph 45). The applicants had “attempted to cross a border in a legal manner, using an official checkpoint and subjecting themselves to border checks as required by the relevant law” (paragraph 55), and their case was “an exemplification of a wider State policy of refusing entry to foreigners coming from Belarus” (paragraph 56).

Access to asylum Pushbacks Chain refoulement Collective expulsion Effective remedy Interim measures Article 3 ECHR

Caution After they were admitted to Poland, the head of the Aliens Office refused them international protection on 14 December 2017, the Refugee Board upheld the refusal on 12 June 2018, and the applicants did not appeal to the administrative courts (paragraph 19). The judgment does not record what happened to them after that. Although they were returned to Belarus after the interim measure had been indicated, the Court made no finding under Article 34: notice of the application was given to the Government only for the complaints under Article 3, Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 and Article 13. Like M.K. and Others v. Poland (see that entry), the judgment concerns an official border crossing in 2016 and 2017. It does not decide the summary returns at the Belarusian border from the summer of 2021, which are before the Grand Chamber in A.R. and Others v. Poland, to be ruled on 24 November 2026.

European Court of Human Rights June 30, 2022 Third country: Belarus. The family went to the crossing at Terespol again and again between February and June 2017 and was each time sent back to Belarus (paragraphs 5 to 11). On 17 July 2017 they told the Court that “they had left the area of the Polish border and returned to Russia” (paragraph 16).

Disposition Unanimously: the application admissible; violations of Article 3, of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4, and of Article 13 taken with Article 3 and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; and “there has been a violation of Article 34 of the Convention”. EUR 30,000 to the applicants jointly for pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage and EUR 700 for costs and expenses; the remainder of the claim dismissed. The judgment became final on 14 November 2022.

From 21 February 2017 the family came to Terespol repeatedly, from April with a written application for international protection, and was refused entry each time (paragraphs 5, 7 and 8). The Court recorded: “At 10.48 a.m. on 16 June 2017 the Court (the duty judge) decided to apply Rule 39 of the Rules of Court, indicating to the Polish Government that the applicants should not be removed to Belarus until 30 June 2017. The Government were informed of the interim measure before the planned time of expulsion. The applicants were nevertheless returned to Belarus at 11.25 a.m.” (paragraph 10). On 19 June 2017 they came back with a copy of the Court’s letter and a written application for international protection, “clearly expressed a wish to lodge this application”, and were turned away again, while a lawyer sent the application to the Border Guard by email, fax and ePUAP (paragraphs 11 and 12). The Court held that the failure to begin any asylum procedure on “the thirty-three occasions when the applicants were at the Polish border crossing constituted a violation of Article 3 of the Convention”, and that Poland “knowingly exposed them to a serious risk of chain refoulement and treatment prohibited by Article 3 of the Convention” (paragraph 42). Their case was “an exemplification of a wider State policy of refusing entry to foreigners coming from Belarus” (paragraph 53), and Poland breached Article 34 by not complying with the interim measure.

Access to asylum Pushbacks Chain refoulement Collective expulsion Effective remedy Interim measures Article 3 ECHR Article 34 ECHR

Caution The judgment does not record what happened to the applicants after they returned to Russia; the interim measure was discontinued on 19 July 2017 (paragraph 16). It describes twenty-four visits to the crossing between 21 February and 14 April 2017, eight more in April and May, and two in June (paragraphs 5, 8, 10 and 11), and gives the total as thirty-three (paragraph 42). Like M.K. and Others v. Poland (see that entry), the judgment concerns an official border crossing in 2016 and 2017. It does not decide the summary returns at the Belarusian border from the summer of 2021, which are before the Grand Chamber in A.R. and Others v. Poland, to be ruled on 24 November 2026.

European Court of Human Rights July 8, 2021 Third country: Belarus. Border guards at Terespol turned them away to Belarus on five occasions in July 2017, including on the day the Court indicated an interim measure and the day after (paragraphs 5, 11, 14 and 69). The Court found that returning them there risked “chain‑refoulement” to Syria (paragraphs 63 and 64).

Disposition Unanimously: a violation of Article 3 “on account of the applicants being denied access to the asylum procedure and exposed to a risk of inhuman and degrading treatment and torture in Syria”; not necessary to examine the complaint about their treatment during border checks; a violation of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; a violation of Article 13 taken with Article 3 and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; and Poland “has failed to discharge its obligations under Article 34 of the Convention”. The Court continued to indicate that the applicants should not be removed to Belarus “if and when they present themselves at the Polish border crossing” until the judgment became final, and awarded EUR 10,000 to each applicant for non-pecuniary damage. The judgment became final on 22 November 2021.

The applicants went to the border crossing at Terespol three times between 14 and 18 July 2017 and, they said, asked each time for international protection (paragraph 5). Each time the border guards issued decisions turning them away on the ground that they were “simply trying to emigrate for economic or personal reasons”, based on official notes that the applicants had not signed (paragraph 8). On 20 July 2017, “at 10.08 a.m. the Court (the duty judge) decided to apply Rule 39 of the Rules of Court, indicating to the Government that the applicants should not be removed to Belarus until 3 August 2017. The Government were informed of the interim measure before the planned time of expulsion. Nevertheless, the applicants were returned to Belarus at 11.25 a.m.” (paragraph 11). The next day they came back with a copy of the Court’s letter and the conscription orders, and were sent back again (paragraphs 13 and 14). The Court held that the applicants “could arguably claim that there was no guarantee that their asylum applications would be seriously examined by the Belarusian authorities and that their return to Syria could violate Article 3 of the Convention”, and that Poland was obliged to allow them “to remain within Polish jurisdiction until such time that their claims had been properly reviewed by a competent domestic authority” (paragraph 64). It rejected the argument that EU law required the refusals: the measure “fell outside the scope of Poland’s strict international legal obligations” (paragraph 67). Sending them back on each of the five occasions “constituted a violation of Article 3 of the Convention” (paragraph 69). Their cases “were part of the same wider policy” found in M.K. and Others v. Poland, and the decisions “constituted a collective expulsion of aliens within the meaning of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4” (paragraph 83).

Access to asylum Pushbacks Chain refoulement Collective expulsion Effective remedy Interim measures Article 3 ECHR Safe third country

Caution Like M.K. and Others v. Poland (see that entry), the judgment concerns an official border crossing in 2016 and 2017. It does not decide the summary returns at the Belarusian border from the summer of 2021, which are before the Grand Chamber in A.R. and Others v. Poland, to be ruled on 24 November 2026. The judgment records that the applicants “currently reside in Belarus” (paragraph 2); it does not record what happened to them after it was delivered.

European Court of Human Rights July 23, 2020 Third country: Belarus. Polish border guards at Terespol and Czeremcha-Połowce refused them entry and returned them to Belarus, on thirty-five, eight and nineteen or more occasions respectively (paragraph 185). The Court held that sending them back there exposed them to a serious risk of chain refoulement to Chechnya.

Disposition Applications joined and, unanimously, declared admissible. Unanimously: a violation of Article 3 “on account of the applicants being denied access to the asylum procedure and exposed to a risk of inhuman and degrading treatment and torture in Chechnya”; not necessary to examine the complaint under Article 3 about their treatment during border checks; a violation of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; a violation of Article 13 taken with Article 3 and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; and Poland “has failed to discharge its obligations under Article 34 of the Convention”. The Court continued to indicate to Poland “not to remove the applicants in cases nos. 40503/17 and 43643/17 to Belarus” … “until such time as the present judgment becomes final, or until a further decision is made”. By six votes to one, EUR 34,000 for non-pecuniary damage in each of the three applications, with costs; the remainder of the claim dismissed unanimously. The judgment became final on 14 December 2020, when a panel of the Grand Chamber rejected the requests for referral by the applicants and by the government.

The applicants came to the border crossings repeatedly and asked for international protection. The border guards refused them entry and sent them back to Belarus. In June 2017 the Court indicated interim measures that they not be returned to Belarus (paragraph 3). The Court held that “pending an application for international protection, a State cannot deny access to its territory to a person presenting himself or herself at a border checkpoint who alleges that he or she may be subjected to ill-treatment if he or she remains on the territory of the neighbouring State, unless adequate measures are taken to eliminate such a risk” (paragraph 179). The applicants “could arguably claim that there was no guarantee that their asylum applications would be seriously examined by the Belarusian authorities and that their return to Chechnya could violate Article 3 of the Convention” (paragraph 178), and “the Polish authorities, by failing to allow the applicants to remain on Polish territory pending the examination of their applications, knowingly exposed them to a serious risk of chain refoulement and treatment prohibited by Article 3 of the Convention” (paragraph 185). It found a collective expulsion. The applicants “attempted to cross the border in a legal manner, using an official checkpoint and subjecting themselves to border checks as required by the relevant law” (paragraph 207), and their cases were “an exemplification of a wider State policy of refusing entry to foreigners coming from Belarus, regardless of whether they were clearly economic migrants or whether they expressed a fear of persecution in their countries of origin” (paragraph 208).

Access to asylum Pushbacks Chain refoulement Collective expulsion Effective remedy Interim measures Article 3 ECHR Safe third country

Caution The applicants presented themselves at official border crossings, and the Court relied on that in finding a collective expulsion (paragraph 207). The judgment does not decide the summary returns at the Belarusian border from the summer of 2021, which are before the Grand Chamber in A.R. and Others v. Poland, to be ruled on 24 November 2026. Judge Eicke’s dissent concerned only the assessment of non-pecuniary damage.

European Court of Human Rights October 21, 2014 Third country: Greece. At the port of Ancona the border police handed them to the captains of the ferries for return to Greece (paragraph 242). According to their lawyer’s letter of 13 April 2011, recorded in the judgment, Reza Karimi was later sent from Italy to Norway under the Dublin II Regulation, by a decision of 28 December 2010, and on arriving in Norway was sent straight back to Afghanistan (paragraph 39).

Disposition The operative part is in French; this is the Coalition’s summary translation. Unanimously: the application struck out for thirty-one applicants; for Reza Karimi, Yasir Zaidi, Mozamil Azimi and Najeeb Heideri (also known as Nagib Haidari), a violation by Greece of Article 13 taken with Article 3; a violation by Italy of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; a violation by Italy of Article 3, because by returning them to Greece the Italian authorities exposed them to the risks arising from the failures of the asylum procedure there; and a violation by Italy of Article 13 taken with Article 3 and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4, for the lack of access to the asylum procedure or any other remedy in the port of Ancona. No need to examine the complaints under Article 2 or Article 34; the remainder of the application inadmissible as against each State. Greece to pay the four EUR 5,000 jointly for costs and expenses; the remainder of the claim dismissed.

The applicants said they had reached Greece in 2007 and 2008 from countries in armed conflict, boarded vessels for Italy at Patras, and were sent straight back to Greece by the border police at Bari, Ancona and Venice (press release). The Court found that at Ancona “les requérants ont été remis sur-le-champ par les autorités des frontières aux capitaines des ferry-boats et n’ont pas eu accès à un interprète ni à des agents pouvant leur fournir les informations minimales nécessaires à propos du droit d’asile et de la procédure pertinente” (paragraph 242; the Coalition’s translation: “the applicants were handed over immediately by the border authorities to the captains of the ferries and had no access to an interpreter or to officials who could give them the minimum information needed about the right to asylum and the relevant procedure”). It held that the measures taken against them at Ancona “s’analysent en des expulsions collectives et indiscriminées” (paragraph 225; the Coalition’s translation: “amount to collective and indiscriminate expulsions”). The Dublin system did not alter that. In the words of the Court’s English press release, “no form of collective and indiscriminate returns could be justified by reference to that system, and it was for the State carrying out the return to ensure that the destination country offered sufficient guarantees in the application of its asylum policy to prevent the person concerned being removed to his country of origin without an assessment of the risks faced.” Against Greece, the Court found a violation of Article 13 with Article 3 because of “l’absence d’accès à la procédure d’asile et du risque d’expulsion des requérants vers l’Afghanistan, où ils étaient susceptibles de subir des traitements inhumains et dégradants” (paragraph 233; the Coalition’s translation: “the lack of access to the asylum procedure and the risk of the applicants’ expulsion to Afghanistan, where they were liable to suffer inhuman and degrading treatment”). Against Italy, it found that by returning them to Greece the Italian authorities exposed them to the risks arising from the failures of the Greek asylum procedure.

Collective expulsion Dublin system Chain refoulement Access to asylum Effective remedy Article 3 ECHR Pushbacks

Caution The judgment was delivered in French only; the English item on HUDOC is a placeholder without text. Quotations from the judgment are given in French with the Coalition’s translation, and English quotations from the Registry’s press release are marked as such; the press release does not bind the Court. The press release says the Court held “by a majority”; the operative part of the judgment says “À L’UNANIMITÉ”, unanimously, and this entry follows the judgment. Thirty-one applicants were struck out under Article 37 § 1 (c); that is not a ruling on the merits of their complaints. The risk of onward expulsion to Afghanistan grounded the finding against Greece, not the findings against Italy.

European Court of Human Rights February 23, 2012 ECHR 2012 Third country: Libya. Intercepted on 6 May 2009, taken to Tripoli on Italian military ships and handed over to the Libyan authorities, under bilateral agreements between Italy and Libya that had entered into force on 4 February 2009 (paragraphs 10 to 13). The Court also found a risk that Libya would send them on to Somalia and Eritrea.

Disposition By thirteen votes to four, the application struck out for two applicants who had died. Unanimously: the applicants “were within the jurisdiction of Italy for the purposes of Article 1 of the Convention”; violations of Article 3 “on account of the fact that the applicants were exposed to the risk of being subjected to ill-treatment in Libya” and “on account of the fact that the applicants were exposed to the risk of being repatriated to Somalia and Eritrea”; a violation of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; violations of Article 13 taken with Article 3 and with Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; the government’s preliminary objections rejected. EUR 15,000 to each applicant for non-pecuniary damage, to be held in trust by their representatives, and EUR 1,575.74 for costs and expenses.

The applicants were part of “a group of about two hundred individuals who left Libya aboard three vessels with the aim of reaching the Italian coast” (paragraph 9). On 6 May 2009, 35 nautical miles south of Lampedusa, ships of the Italian Revenue Police and Coastguard intercepted them; they were transferred onto Italian military ships and returned to Tripoli, where they were handed over to the Libyan authorities (paragraphs 10 to 12). The Minister of the Interior said that between 6 and 10 May 2009 “more than 471 irregular migrants had been intercepted on the high seas and transferred to Libya” under the agreements (paragraph 13). The Court held that “in the period between boarding the ships of the Italian armed forces and being handed over to the Libyan authorities, the applicants were under the continuous and exclusive de jure and de facto control of the Italian authorities” (paragraph 81), and that “by transferring the applicants to Libya, the Italian authorities, in full knowledge of the facts, exposed them to treatment proscribed by the Convention” (paragraph 137). It found a second violation of Article 3 in the risk of onward return: “indirect refoulement of an alien leaves the responsibility of the Contracting State intact” (paragraph 146). “It is a matter for the State carrying out the return to ensure that the intermediary country offers sufficient guarantees to prevent the person concerned being removed to his country of origin without an assessment of the risks faced. The Court observes that that obligation is all the more important when, as in the instant case, the intermediary country is not a State Party to the Convention” (paragraph 147). And it found a collective expulsion: “the transfer of the applicants to Libya was carried out without any form of examination of each applicant’s individual situation” (paragraph 185), so that “the removal of the applicants was of a collective nature, in breach of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 to the Convention” (paragraph 186).

Pushbacks Extraterritorial jurisdiction Chain refoulement Collective expulsion Effective remedy Article 3 ECHR Bilateral agreements

Caution The judgment decides Italy’s responsibility for people its own ships took to Libya and handed over. In S.S. and Others v. Italy, decided on 20 May 2025 (no. 21660/18), about an incident at sea off Libya on 6 November 2017, the Court declared the application inadmissible, holding that “the applicants were not under the jurisdiction of Italy within the meaning of Article 1 of the Convention” (paragraph 114). The Coalition’s page on Italy sets out both.