Legal summary
March 2026
Landika v. Slovenia - 45987/22
Judgment 3.3.2026 [Section III]
Article 1 of Protocol No. 1
Article 1 para. 1 of Protocol No. 1
Peaceful enjoyment of possessions
Inability to recover “old” foreign-currency savings deposited in Ljubljana Bank Ljubljana (Sarajevo branch) and converted into privatisation certificates administered by Bosnia and Herzegovina authorities: no violation
Facts – The case concerns the applicants’ inability to recover, under legislation enacted in Slovenia in 2015 following the Court’s judgment in Ališić and Others v. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia [GC], the “old” foreign-currency savings of their predecessor, V.L., deposited in the Sarajevo branch of Ljubljana Bank Ljubljana “(“LBL”). The claim relating to those savings had been transferred ex officio in 1998 to a privatisation account administered by the authorities of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (“FBH”). The transfer was carried out under the Law on the Settlement of Claims in the Privatisation Process of 1997 (“1997 Claims Settlement Act”) enacted by the FBH at the start of the privatisation process in the FBH. Neither V.L. nor the applicants used the savings in the privatisation process.
The Act on the Implementation of the Judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in Case No. 60642/08 of 2015 (“the Ališić Implementation Act”) established a mechanism for recovering unpaid “old” foreign-currency savings previously deposited in the Sarajevo and Zagreb branches of LBL subject to the conditions set out therein. The scheme did not cover funds that had already been paid out, or that had been transferred from those accounts into other accounts, including special privatisation accounts for designated purposes. V. L.’s request under that Act to recover his “old” foreign‑currency savings was refused on the grounds that savings subject to the transfer of claims were excluded from the Act’s repayment scheme. The savings were no longer recorded as a balance in his favour.
V.L. challenged that decision and, after his death, the applicants continued the domestic proceedings in his place. Their claim was dismissed by the domestic courts at several levels of jurisdiction, including the Slovenian Constitutional Court.
Law – Article 1 of Protocol No. 1:
(1) Whether the present case should be distinguished from Ališić and Others – In Ališić and Others the Court had found that claims related to “old” foreign-currency savings had survived the dissolution of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (“the SFRY”) and that Slovenia had retained control and responsibility for LBL, which operated the Sarajevo branch, and therefore remained liable for “old” foreign-currency savings in that branch.
Furthermore in that judgment, the Court had pointed out that the general measures indicated in the context of Article 46 did not apply to those who, while in the same position as the respective applicants, had already been paid their entire “old” foreign-currency savings, such as those who had been able to withdraw their savings on humanitarian grounds or used them in the privatisation process in the FBH or had been paid their savings in the Zagreb and Skopje branches of LBL by the Croatian and Macedonian governments. The Court had indicated that Serbia and Slovenia might exclude such persons from their repayment schemes. Moreover, where only a part of a person’s “old” foreign-currency savings had thus been repaid, those States had been responsible for the rest.
Thus, despite the similar nature of the complaints lodged by the present applicants and those in Ališić and Others, they related to distinct factual circumstances. The claims relating to the savings of the applicants in Ališić and Others had not been transferred to special privatisation accounts in the FBH, as those savings had not fallen within the scope of the 1997 Claims Settlement Act and the applicants had maintained the amount of their savings as the balance on their bank accounts throughout. Following the implementation of the judgment in Slovenia, savings such as those of the applicants in that case had been included in the repayment scheme. However, savings subject to the transfer of claims, including those of the applicants’ predecessor, had not been; V.L.’s savings had fallen within the scope of the 1997 Claims Settlement Act.
Consequently, in Ališić and Others, the Court had not examined the implications of the transfer of claims for the liability of LBL and, in turn, that of Slovenia – a matter central to the present case.
The Court observed, that the Committee of Ministers, in finding that all the measures required of Slovenia in Ališić and Others under Article 46 § 1 of the Convention had been adopted, had explicitly noted that the final resolution in that case had been entirely without prejudice to the Court’s conclusions in cases addressing the issue of responsibility for the repayment of deposits held in the Sarajevo branch of LBL transferred to privatisation accounts in accordance with the legislation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Accordingly, the Court considered that the applicants’ complaint rested on certain pertinent factual and legal circumstances which had not underpinned the complaints in Ališić and Others and which had to be examined anew. However, the principles and considerations set out by the Grand Chamber in that case had to be taken into account, where relevant.
(2) Compliance with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 – The Court, following its approach in Ališić and Others, examined the complaint under the general principle of the peaceful enjoyment of property, as laid down in the first rule of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1, finding it unnecessary to categorise its examination of the case strictly as being under the head of positive or negative obligations of the respondent State.
In view of the domestic courts’ comprehensive examination of the relevant domestic law and detailed reasoning, the Court saw no reason to conclude that the principle of lawfulness had not been respected. Furthermore, as found in Ališić and Others, by taking measures to prevent the uncontrolled withdrawal of “old” foreign-currency savings, the successor States of the SFRY had acted in the public interest of protecting their respective banking systems and national economies. The same objectives had legitimately underpinned the limitations that had been applied to the measures intended to repay or compensate “old” foreign-currency savers.
The Court thus examined whether the respondent State could be considered responsible for the non-payment of the applicants’ claims relating to “old” foreign-currency savings.
Having regard to the considerations set out in Ališić and Others, the Court found that V.L.’s savings could be considered to have initially fallen within the respondent State’s liability. However, it had to be determined whether that liability had persisted in view of the fact that the claim relating to his savings had been transferred to a privatisation account in the FBH under the 1997 Claims Settlement Act and, consequently, whether the respondent State had been required, as a matter of obligation under the Convention, ratified by Slovenia in 1994, to repay those savings.
In so far as the applicants and the third-party interveners had relied on decisions of the Constitutional Court of the FBH, of the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Sarajevo Municipal Court, the Court found that they did not appear to have had the effect of invalidating transfers of claims that had already taken place.
The regulation and operation of the privatisation certificate scheme, as well as the privatisation process in Bosnia and Herzegovina in general, fell within the domestic jurisdiction of the latter. As noted in the Ališić and Others judgment, the succession negotiations did not prevent successor States from adopting measures at national level aimed at protecting the interest of “old” foreign‑currency savers. What was material in the present case was that, once such measures had been adopted – particularly in so far as they relieved the banks of their contractual obligations towards savers – the bank from which claims had been transferred could not be held responsible for the inadequacy of those measures.
Moreover, it had not been alleged that the respondent State bore any responsibility for any shortcomings in the regulation and management of the privatisation scheme and the related certificates in the FBH in compliance with the property rights of those affected. Nor could it bear any responsibility for the fact that the transfer of claims had been carried out without the respective savers’ consent; the transfer had been carried out pursuant to the legislation of the FBH by the bank created by the FBH authorities (Ljubljana Bank Sarajevo) without any involvement of LBL.
Accordingly, the Court found that Slovenia could not be considered liable for “old” foreign-currency savings in the Sarajevo branch of LBL after the related claims had been transferred to special privatisation accounts administered by the FBH privatisation authorities. It had not been therefore responsible for the applicants’ inability to freely dispose of such savings. That issue had been thoroughly considered in the domestic proceedings, in which V.L. and subsequently the applicants had been able to fully participate. Domestic decisions refusing their claim had been based on sound grounds, many of which the Court endorsed in its reasoning.
The Court also noted that the respondent State’ responsibility for the failure to pay V.L. the “old” foreign-currency savings deposited in the Sarajevo branch of LBL could not be established even for the period between the ratification of the Convention by Slovenia on 28 June 1994 and the transfer of those savings to the privatisation account on 24 April 1998. In that period, liability for such savings had been expressly assumed by the Bosnian-Herzegovinian bank – Ljubljana Bank Sarajevo – and that assumption of liability had not been removed from the court register until 2004, after the savings had already been transferred to the privatisation account in the FBH.
Conclusion: no violation (unanimously).
(See Ališić and Others v. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia [GC], 60642/08, 16 July 2014, Legal Summary)
© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights
This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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