SECOND SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 42950/07
Hüseyin ALTUNAY
against Turkey
The European Court of Human Rights (Second Section), sitting on 28 March 2017 as a Committee composed of:
Paul Lemmens, President,
Ksenija Turković,
Jon Fridrik Kjølbro, judges,
and Hasan Bakırcı, Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to the above application lodged on 24 September 2007,
Having regard to the observations submitted by the respondent Government and the observations in reply submitted by the applicant,
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
THE FACTS
1. The applicant, Mr Hüseyin Altunay, is a Turkish national, who was born in 1934 and lives in Karaman. He was represented before the Court by Ms Ö. Yıldız, a lawyer practising in Mersin.
2. The Turkish Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent.
A. The circumstances of the case
3. The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows.
4. The applicant had a plot of land in Çavuş Village, in the Ermenek District of Karaman, which had been registered in the land register as block no. 121, parcel no. 11.
5. On 10 May 2004 the forest administration lodged a request with the Ermenek Civil Court of First Instance and sought the annulment of the applicant’s title deed alleging that his land was part of the public forest area.
6. On 2 November 2006 the Ermenek Civil Court of First Instance ordered that the applicant’s title deed be annulled and the land be entered in the land register as belonging to the Treasury, holding that the land was part of the public forest area. The applicant’s appeal was rejected by the Court of Cassation and the decision became final on 27 March 2007.
B. Relevant domestic law and practice
7. A description of the domestic law and practice with respect to the Compensation Commission mentioned below (paragraphs 10-11) may be found in Savaşçın and Others v. Turkey ((dec.), no. 15661/07, 7 June 2016).
COMPLAINTS
8. The applicant complained under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention that he had been deprived of his property without receiving any compensation. Relying on Article 6 of the Convention, the applicant further complained about the unfairness of the proceedings.
THE LAW
A. As to Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention
9. The applicant alleged under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention that the annulment of his title deed without any compensation constituted a disproportionate burden and thus breached his right to peaceful enjoyment of his possessions.
10. The Government noted that pursuant to Law no. 6384 of 9 January 2013 a new Compensation Commission had been established in Turkey to deal with applications concerning the length of proceedings, the delayed execution of judgments and the non-execution of judgments. They further noted that the competence of the Compensation Commission was subsequently enlarged by decrees adopted on 16 March 2014 and 9 March 2016 to examine complaints relating to, among other things, the alleged breaches of the right to peaceful enjoyment of possessions on account of the annulment of applicants’ title deeds where the land at issue is classified as part of the public forest. Accordingly, they maintained that the applicant had not exhausted domestic remedies, as he had not made any application to the Compensation Commission.
11. The Court observes that, as pointed out by the Government, a new domestic remedy has been established in Turkey following the application of the pilot judgment procedure in the case of Ümmühan Kaplan v. Turkey (no. 24240/07, 20 March 2012). Subsequently, in its decision in the case of Savaşçın and Others v. Turkey ((dec.), no. 15661/07, 7 June 2016), the Court declared the application inadmissible on the ground that the applicants had failed to exhaust domestic remedies, that is to say the new remedy. In so doing, the Court considered in particular that this new remedy was a priori accessible and capable of offering a reasonable prospect of redress for complaints concerning the annulment of the applicants’ title deeds because their land was classified as part of the public forest area.
12. The Court notes that in its decision in the case of Ümmühan Kaplan (cited above, § 77), it stressed that it could nevertheless examine, under its normal procedure, applications of that type which had already been communicated to the Government.
13. However, taking into account the Government’s preliminary objection with regard to the applicant’s failure to make use of the new domestic remedy established by Law no. 6384, the Court reiterates its conclusion in the case of Savaşçın and Others, cited above.
14. In view of the above, the Court concludes that the applicant’s complaint regarding the annulment of his title deed should be rejected under Article 35 §§ 1 and 4 of the Convention for non‑exhaustion of domestic remedies.
B. As to Article 6 of the Convention
15. The applicant complained under Article 6 of the Convention that the domestic proceedings had been unfair.
16. In the light of all the material in its possession and in so far as the matter complained of is within its competence, the Court concludes that this complaint does not disclose any appearance of a violation of Article 6 of the Convention. Accordingly, the Court rejects it as manifestly ill-founded, pursuant to Article 35 §§ 3 (a) and 4 of the Convention.
For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,
Declares the application inadmissible.
Done in English and notified in writing on 4 May 2017.
Hasan BakırcıPaul Lemmens
Deputy RegistrarPresident
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy