Information Note on the Court’s case-law 91
November 2006
Kovačić and Others v. Slovenia - 45133/98, 44574/98 and 48316/99
Judgment 6.11.2006 [Section III]
Article 1 of Protocol No. 1
Article 1 para. 1 of Protocol No. 1
Peaceful enjoyment of possessions
Some applicants had received payment in full of “frozen” foreign currency deposits, and domestic proceedings in Croatia are still open to a further applicant: struck out
Article 37
Article 37-1-c
Continued examination not justified
Some applicants had received payment in full of “frozen” foreign currency deposits, and domestic proceedings in Croatia are still open to a further applicant: struck out
[This case was referred to the Grand Chamber on 23 May 2007]
Facts: Before the dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (“the SFRY”) in 1991, the applicants or their relatives all deposited hard foreign currencies in savings accounts with the office of a Slovenian bank (Ljubljanska banka) in Zagreb (Croatia). Funds in hard foreign currencies deposited with commercial banks in the SFRY were in general transferred to the National Bank of Yugoslavia in Belgrade in accordance with the legislation applicable at the time. Accounts in hard foreign currency were guaranteed by the SFRY. Owing to the monetary crisis, withdrawal of hard foreign currency from such so-called “old savings accounts” was progressively restricted by legislation enacted during the 1980s and the early 1990s. Since then the applicants or their relatives had generally been unable to gain access to the money in their accounts.
Since Slovenia and Croatia became independent in 1991, Croatia has taken the view that it is either the Ljubljana Bank or the Slovenian State which should meet the liabilities owed to customers of the Croatian branch. However, Slovenia considers that those liabilities should be divided under the succession arrangements among the five States formed from the dissolved SFRY. The total amount of savings in strong foreign currencies deposited with the Croatian branch of the Slovenian bank has been estimated at approximately EUR 150,000,000 with accrued interest, and 140,000 investors appear to be involved.
In 2001 the SFRY successor States signed an Agreement on Succession Issues which entered into force in 2004. In 2003, after a change of legislation in Croatia, 42 individuals, includingtwo of the three applicants in this case (Mr Kovačić and Mr Mrkonjić), lodged requests for the seizure and sale of real estate owned by the Ljubljana Bank in that country. In the course of those proceedings, the assets of the Zagreb main branch were liquidated. As a result, each of these two applicants was awarded the equivalent of some EUR 25,000 plus interest and costs for the enforcement proceedings. In 2005 they received full payment of their foreign-currency deposits.
All applicants complained that they had not been able to withdraw the foreign currency they had deposited before the dissolution of the SFRY. They claimed that the Ljubljana Bank or Slovenia, as a successor State which had assumed the SFRY's obligations for foreign-currency savings on the break-up of Yugoslavia, should repay them the money deposited with accrued interest. Mr Kovačić also complained under Article 14 of the Convention that he had been discriminated against on the grounds of nationality, in that Slovenian account holders at the Zagreb branch had been allowed to withdraw their savings.
Law:It had become clear in the course of the Court proceedings that Mr Kovačić and Mr Mrkonjić had received payment in full of their foreign currency deposits; in their cases, therefore, the matter in question had been resolved. As to Ms Golubović, the Court considered that in cases in which liability for a former State's debt was disputed by the successor States, a claimant could reasonably be expected to seek redress where other claimants had been successful. For reasons which remained unexplained, this applicant (and her heir) had taken no action in Croatia, although she would have been likely to have been successful had she done so. In any event, it was still open to her heir to bring such proceedings. In view of those circumstances and given its conclusion concerning the other two applicants, the Court considered that it was no longer justified to continue the examination of Ms Golubović's application. Furthermore, the Court was satisfied that respect for human rights as defined in the Convention and its Protocols did not require otherwise.
Conclusion: struck out (unanimously).
© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights
This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
Click here for the Case-Law Information Notes
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy