Published on 9 October 2023
SECOND SECTION
Application no. 17124/22
Stasys BUJA
against Lithuania
lodged on 18 March 2022
communicated on 18 September 2023
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
The application concerns the foreseeability of an interference with the right to use land.
In 2017 the applicant signed a land use agreement with the owners of a plot of land in Grendavė, in the Trakai Region, whereby he obtained the right to use it for agriculture.
In 2020 the local branch of the National Land Service (hereinafter “the NLS”) inspected the plot and found that the applicant had ploughed up a public road which had previously existed there and had sown grain in its place. He was given a fine of 450 euros (EUR) for the administrative offence of unauthorised occupation or use of land. The applicant disputed the fine. He submitted that he had consulted the territorial plan of the plot provided by its owners, the data available on the websites of the Centre of Registers and the NLS, the special territorial plan of residential areas of the Trakai Region Municipality, and the map of the limits of agricultural areas of the Trakai Region, prepared by the NLS in 2009, but no such road was marked in any of those documents. However, those arguments were dismissed by the administrative courts. They found that the road in question was marked in the territorial plans of the Grendavė area adopted by the Vilnius County Administration in 2000 and 2004, which were available online, therefore, the applicant ought to have known about it. Although he argued that later territorial plans of the Grendavė area, adopted in 2006 and 2008, no longer included the road, the courts held that those later plans had not affected the validity of the older ones. They also stated that the there was no requirement for a municipal road to be registered in public registers. Nonetheless, the courts reduced the amount of the fine imposed on the applicant to EUR 350.
The applicant complains that he was fined for ploughing up a road that was not properly marked in official documents. He submits that he consulted the most recent and most accessible documents and, on that basis, concluded that there were no obstacles to ploughing up the relevant part of the plot. Accordingly, fining him was contrary to the principle of legal certainty. He invokes Article 6 § 1 of the Convention.
QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES
Has there been a violation of the applicant’s right to peaceful enjoyment of his “possessions” within the meaning of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention (see, mutatis mutandis, Bruncrona v. Finland, no. 41673/98, § 79, 16 November 2004, and Di Marco v. Italy, no. 32521/05, §§ 48-53, 26 April 2011)? In particular, was the interference with his right to use the plot of land provided for by territorial planning documents and other regulations that were sufficiently accessible, precise and foreseeable in their application (see Lekić v. Slovenia [GC], no. 36480/07, §§ 94-95, 11 December 2018, and, mutatis mutandis, Jokela v. Finland, no. 28856/95, § 65, ECHR 2002-IV)?