KOULLOUPPA v. CYPRUS

THIRD SECTION

DECISION

Application no. 35651/20
Georgios KOULLOUPPA
against Cyprus

The European Court of Human Rights (Third Section), sitting on 19 March 2024 as a Committee composed of:

 Darian Pavli, President,
 Georgios A. Serghides,
 Oddný Mjöll Arnardóttir, judges,
and Olga Chernishova, Deputy Section Registrar,

Having regard to:

the application (no. 35651/20) against the Republic of Cyprus lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 10 August 2020 by a Cypriot national, Mr Georgios Koullouppa, who was born in 1953 and lives in Melbourne (“the applicant”) and was represented by Mr M. Orphanides, a lawyer practising in Nicosia;

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

1.  The applicant was the registered owner of a plot of land in Nicosia, with the registration no. 5873, plot 1300 (formerly 233), Plan/Sheet 30-06E2, of 12,660 sq. m (“the property”).

2.  On 12 January 1998 the applicant obtained a building permit according to the terms of which part of the property would be transferred, under the Streets and Buildings Regulation Law (Cap. 96), to the State for, inter alia, street-widening purposes. The applicant developed the property in accordance with the terms of the building permit without challenging them.

3.  On 16 September 2005 the State ordered the compulsory acquisition of the affected part of the property. The authorities offered the applicant 100 Cyprus pounds (CYP), which the applicant did not accept.

4.  On 21 June 2006 the applicant filed an application (αρ. 55/2006) with the Nicosia District Court for the determination of the amount of fair and reasonable compensation for the compulsory acquisition of his property.

5.  On 11 November 2013 the Nicosia District Court issued a decision ordering the State to pay the applicant 761,400 euros (EUR) plus interest at 9% until the payment of that amount, on the basis of the Compulsory Acquisition Law and Article 23 § 4(c) of the Constitution which provides for the payment of just and equitable compensation in the event of a compulsory acquisition.

6.  Subsequently the Government filed an appeal (αρ. 4/2014) with the Supreme Court (appellate jurisdiction).

7.  On 12 February 2020 the Supreme Court issued its judgment in favour of the Government. It observed that the applicant had developed the property in accordance with the terms of the building permit which provided that part of his property would be ceded to the State for street-widening purposes. The court considered in sum that since the applicant complied with the terms of the building permit, the affected part of his property had already automatically been transferred to the State at that time. As such, according to the court, the Government would not need to pursue the compulsory acquisition of property that no longer belonged to the applicant, as it had already belonged to the State. In short, the court concluded that the applicant could not claim compensation on the basis of the market value of the property at the time of the compulsory acquisition, but instead his right to compensation had been limited to the harm suffered as a result of the street-widening scheme on the basis of section 13 of Cap. 96.

8.  The applicant complained before this Court that the State had compulsorily acquired part of his property without compensating him, in violation of the provisions of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention. He further complained under Article 14 in conjunction with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1, that the Supreme Court’s judgment created a discrimination between people in his position whose property is affected by a street‑widening scheme and can only seek compensation under the Streets and Buildings Law and those whose property is not affected by such a scheme and could seek compensation under the more favourable terms of the Compulsory Acquisition Law, even though in both cases the property owners were deprived of their property.

THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT

9.  The Court refers to the general principles regarding exhaustion of domestic remedies as summarised in the case of Vučković and Others v. Serbia ((preliminary objection) [GC], nos. 17153/11 and 29 others, §§ 69‑77, 25 March 2014).

10.  The applicant’s property, like in Damianou Charalambide v. Cyprus (dec.), no. 80777/17, 7 November 2023, became State property with the issuance of the building permit, long before the issuance of the order for compulsory acquisition, and, as a result, the Supreme Court dismissed his claim for compensation under the Compulsory Acquisition Law and held that the applicant ought to have claimed compensation under section 13 of the Streets and Buildings Regulation Law (Cap. 96) (see paragraphs 2 and 7 above).

11.  The Court observes that in Damianou Charalambide, cited above, the Chamber considered that the applicant failed to exhaust the relevant effective domestic remedy, namely, claiming compensation under section 13(1) interpreted and applied in conjunction with Article 23 §§ 2 and 4 of the Constitution and dismissed the application as inadmissible (ibid, §§ 59-67). Similarly, the applicant in the present case has not availed himself of this legal avenue. The Court sees no reason to depart from its findings in Damianou Charalambide (ibid).

12.  In view of the above, the Court finds the applicant’s complaint under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 inadmissible for non-exhaustion of domestic remedies. It follows that the present complaint is inadmissible under Article 35 § 1 of the Convention and must be rejected pursuant to Article 35 § 4.

13.  In view of the Court’s conclusion above concerning Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 and considering that Article 14 has no independent existence in the circumstances, the related complaint is incompatible ratione materiae with the provisions of the Convention, within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 and must be rejected, pursuant to Article 35 § 4 of the Convention.

For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,

Declares the application inadmissible.

Done in English and notified in writing on 11 April 2024.

 Olga Chernishova Darian Pavli
 Deputy Registrar President