FIRST SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 1789/15
Tanja OŠKRT BUNJEVČEVIĆ
against Croatia
The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting on 16 March 2021 as a Committee composed of:
Erik Wennerström, President,
Lorraine Schembri Orland,
Ioannis Ktistakis, judges,
and Attila Teplán, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to the above application lodged on 1 January 2015,
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, Ms Tanja Oškrt Bunjevčević, is a Croatian national, who was born in 1947 and lives in Zagreb. She was represented before the Court by Ms T. Klaić-Stetter, a lawyer practising in Zagreb.
2. The Croatian Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent, Ms Š., Stažnik.
3. The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows.The first set of enforcement proceedings
4. On 1 July 2003 the City of Zagreb lodged an application for enforcement against the applicant with the Zagreb Municipal Court (Općinski sud u Zagrebu) regarding an outstanding debt of 20,861.28 Croatian kunas (HRK). The application was based on an authentic instrument (vjerodostojna isprava), namely, an extract from the City’s business records which indicated that the applicant had not paid the rent for a lease of business premises.
5. On 17 July 2003 the court issued a writ of execution based on authentic instrument (rješenje o ovrsi na temelju vjerodostojne isprave) against the applicant, ordering her to pay the said amount.
6. The writ was carried out so that in the period between 1 February 2008 and 31 July 2010 each month one third of the applicant’s pension was retained directly by the Croatian Pension Fund and paid to the City with a view to settling her debt, while the remaining two thirds were paid into her bank account.
7. By a decision of 1 February 2011, which became final on 2 March 2011, these proceedings were discontinued because the debt had been paid in full.The second set of enforcement proceedings
8. Meanwhile, on 24 January 2005 the City of Zagreb lodged another application for enforcement against the applicant with the Zagreb Municipal Court in respect of a further outstanding debt of HRK 271,673.83. This application was also based on an extract from the City’s business records and also concerned unpaid rent for a lease of business premises.
9. The City sought enforcement by seizure of funds in the applicant’s bank accounts, by garnishment of one third of her salary or pension, and by seizure of her movable and immovable property. The application for enforcement was formulated in general terms as regards the means and objects of enforcement, that is, without specifying the applicant’s bank accounts or the property sought to be seized.
10. On 27 June 2005 the Zagreb Municipal Court issued the writ of execution based on authentic instrument by stamping the application for enforcement (see paragraph 34 below). The stamp contained an information notice (pouka o pravnom lijeku) indicating that, within eight days from the service of the writ, the applicant could lodge either a complaint (prigovor) against it if she wished to challenge the debt itself or an appeal (žalba) if she wished to contest only the enforcement as such (see paragraph 32 below).
11. The applicant did not lodge either of these remedies and the writ became final on 7 February 2006.
12. After establishing that the applicant did not own any immovable property and after unsuccessful attempts to carry out the writ by seizure of her movables, which failed because she had not had any valuable assets, the City of Zagreb on 25 March 2009 asked the enforcement court to obtain information on the applicant’s bank accounts by issuing a decision addressed to all banks in Croatia ordering temporary seizure of funds in the applicant’s bank accounts.
13. On 20 October 2009 the Zagreb Municipal Court issued such decision (rješenje o privremenoj pljenidbi). It did so by stamping the City’s motion of 25 March 2009 (see paragraph 12 above). The stamp contained an information notice that an appeal was available against the decision within eight days of its service. The parties agree that this information notice was wrong and that actually no appeal lied against the decision in question.
14. On 9 November 2009 the applicant lodged an appeal against that decision. She claimed that the only funds in her bank account had been her pension instalments which meant that by seizing those funds her whole pension would be seized, which was not permitted under the Enforcement Act (see paragraph 37 below).
15. On 3 December 2009 the City of Zagreb replied to the applicant’s appeal. It argued that decisions on temporary seizure were not to be served on enforcement debtors and that no appeals were allowed against such decisions. It further denied the applicant’s claim that her pension would be affected by the seizure of funds in her bank account (see paragraph 14 above). In this respect the City submitted that it had requested the information from the Croatian Pension Fund which informed it that the applicant had been insured with the Fund until 10 September 2003. This, in the City’s view, meant that she had not been receiving any pension at the time they proposed seizure of funds in her bank accounts (see paragraph 12 above). Lastly, the City, which had in the meantime obtained the relevant information on the applicant’s bank accounts, asked the court to issue a writ of execution by seizure of funds on two specific bank accounts held by the applicant.
16. The enforcement court never decided on the applicant’s appeal of 9 November 2009 (see paragraph 14 above).
17. On 8 December 2009 the court issued a writ of execution by seizure of funds in the specific bank accounts held by the applicant and served it on her on 18 March 2010. The writ, contrary to the law (see paragraph 34 below), contained no information notice on legal remedies available against it.
18. The applicant did not appeal against the writ, which thus became final on 27 March 2010.
19. The Government submitted that after January 2011 no amount had been seized from the applicant because since then there had been no deposits in her bank account. The documents submitted by the applicant seem to corroborate that information.
20. On 20 April 2011 the applicant hired an advocate to represent her in the proceedings.
21. On 2 November 2011 the applicant, now legally represented, lodged an application to restore the proceedings into the status quo ante (restitutio in integrum ob terminem elapsum), together with an appeal against the writ of execution of 8 December 2009 (see paragraph 17 above and paragraph 33 below).
22. The applicant submitted that the earlier decision on temporary seizure of 20 October 2009 had wrongly indicated that an appeal was allowed, whereas the subsequent writ of execution of 8 December 2009 had not contained such information even though an appeal was allowed against it (see paragraphs 13 and 17 above). Owing to such wrong information, she, not being legally represented at the time, had not used the proper remedies in a timely manner.
23. Specifically, the applicant argued that, given the sequence of events, the wrong information on remedies in the eyes of a lay person created the impression that the earlier decision of 20 October 2009 was the one which was (more) important. This was precisely so because it indicated that an appeal was available against it (see paragraph 13 above), and that the writ had been the mere consequence of that decision and thus had been less important as no remedy seemed to have been available against it (see paragraph 17 above). She had thus expressed her arguments against the seizure in her appeal against the decision of 20 October 2009 (see paragraph 14 above).
24. As to the merits, she submitted that all the money in her bank account had been seized on the basis of the writ of execution of 8 December 2009 (see paragraph 17 above). The only funds she had been receiving in her bank account were her monthly pension instalments. Since one third of her pension, that is, the maximum amount that could be seized in enforcement proceedings, had already been seized by the Croatian Pension Fund in favour of Zagreb Municipality in the first set of enforcement proceedings (see paragraphs 5-6 above), in reality all her pension had been seized, which was unlawful (see paragraph 37 below).
25. By a decision of 11 December 2012 the Zagreb Municipal Court declared inadmissible the applicant’s appeal of 2 November 2011 against the writ of execution of 8 December 2009 (see paragraphs 17 and 21 above). Given that the contested writ had been served on the applicant on 18 March 2010 the court held that the applicant’s appeal of 2 November 2011 had been lodged outside the statutory eight-day time-limit (see paragraphs 17 and 21 above and paragraph 32 below). The court also held that the applicant’s appeal had not been based on any of the grounds for the so‑called extraordinary appeal, which was available even after the expiry of the said statutory time-limit (see paragraph 36 below). Lastly, the applicant’s application for restoration of the proceedings into the status quo ante was also held to have been inadmissible because it had been lodged outside the objective statutory three-month time-limit (see paragraph 33 below).
26. On 11 January 2013 the applicant appealed against that decision relying, in substance, on the same arguments as in her earlier appeal (see paragraphs 21-24 above).
27. By a decision of 16 December 2013 the Varaždin County Court (Županijski sud u Varaždinu) dismissed the applicant’s appeal and upheld the first-instance decision of 11 December 2012 (see paragraph 25 below).
28. The applicant then, on 24 March 2013, lodged a constitutional complaint alleging violations of her right to appeal, the right to fair proceedings, the right of ownership and the right to fair remuneration, all guaranteed by the Croatian Constitution. She essentially reiterated the same arguments as in her appeals of 2 November 2011 and 11 January 2013 (see 21-24 and 26 above).
29. By a decision of 19 June 2014 the Constitutional Court (Ustavni sud Republike Hrvatske) declared the applicant’s constitutional complaint inadmissible on the grounds that the contested decision was not amenable to constitutional review. The Constitutional Court’s decision was served on the applicant’s representative on 1 July 2014.
Relevant legal framework and practiceThe Constitution
30. The relevant Article of the Constitution of the Republic of Croatia (Ustav Republike Hrvatske, Official Gazette no. 56/90 with subsequent amendments) reads:
Article 18
“The right to appeal against decisions adopted in the first-instance proceedings before a court or other authority shall be guaranteed.
The right of appeal may exceptionally be excluded in cases provided by law if other legal protection is ensured.”Enforcement legislation
31. The Enforcement Act of 1996 (Ovršni zakon, Official Gazette no. 57/96 with subsequent amendments – “the 1996 Enforcement Act”) was in force between 11 August 1996 and 14 October 2012.
32. Section 11 provided that, unless the Enforcement Act prescribed otherwise: (a) an appeal was available against the first-instance decisions (including writs of execution), and (b) an appeal had to be lodged within eight days from the service of the first-instance decision (this time-limit was introduced by earlier, 1978 Enforcement Act, and remained in force ever since). The writ of execution based on authentic instrument could be challenged by a complaint (prigovor) if the enforcement debtor wished to challenge the debt itself.
33. The same section provided that the application for restoration of the proceedings into the status quo ante (prijedlog za povrat u prijašnje stanje) was in the enforcement proceedings available only if a party missed the time-limit for lodging an appeal. That remedy was regulated by the Civil Procedure Act (Zakon o parničnom postupku, Official Gazette no. 53/91 with further amendments) which provided that, a party which had been unable to comply with the statutory time-limit for justified reasons, could apply for the restoration of the proceedings into the status quo ante within eight days from the day the hindrance that had caused the omission had ceased to exist but no later than three months from the date of the omission.
34. Section 37(3) provided that a writ of execution did not need to contain reasons and that it could be issued by placing a stamp on the application for enforcement. Section 37(4) provided that the writ had to have an information notice on remedies available against it.
35. Section 46 provided that an enforcement debtor could lodge an appeal against the writ of execution, inter alia, if the enforcement was ordered in respect of assets exempt from enforcement or in respect of which the enforcement was restricted.
36. Section 49 provided for the possibility of an “extraordinary appeal” against a writ of execution, which could be lodged at any time until the conclusion of enforcement proceedings. However, such appeal could be lodged only on some specific grounds. Ordering enforcement in respect of assets exempt from enforcement or in respect of which the enforcement was restricted was not among those grounds.
37. Section 149 provided that if the writ of execution was carried out by garnishment of the enforcement debtor’s salary or pension, the amount of 2/3 of the average net salary in Croatia was exempt from enforcement.
38. The 1996 Enforcement Act was superseded by the 2012 Enforcement Act (Ovršni zakon, Official Gazette no. 112/12 with subsequent amendments) which has been in force since 15 October 2012. Its section 369 provides that ongoing enforcement proceedings instituted under the 1996 Enforcement Act must be completed under the provisions of that Act.Relevant practice
39. Under the case-law of Croatian courts, if an information notice concerning available remedies wrongly indicates a time-limit which is longer than the one provided for by the relevant legislation, a remedy lodged by the party who relied on such wrong information cannot be declared inadmissible as being out of time (see the Supreme Court’s decisions nos. Rev-57/1999-2 of 28 April 1999 and Rev-x 786/14-2 of 14 December 2016 as well as the Constitutional Court’s decision no. U‑III‑3071/2006 of 18 March 2009).
40. On the other hand, if no remedy is available under the relevant legislation and the notice wrongly indicates otherwise, a remedy lodged by the party who relied on such wrong information is to be declared inadmissible because such incorrect information cannot derogate the statutory provisions and cannot create a remedy which is not provided for by law (see the Supreme Court’s decisions no. Kž 4/07-3 of 5 January 2007 and Kž 538/04-3 of 23 July 2004 and the High Administrative Court’s decision no. Usž-2343/17-2 of 17 January 2018).
41. Lastly, if the contested decision, contrary to the law, does not contain an information notice on legal remedies and a remedy is available, that is not a reason which could justify not lodging the available remedy or lodging it outside of the statutory time-limit.
In particular, in its decision no. Psz 320/1992-4 of 10 May 1993 the Supreme Court held as follows:
“...possible absence of an information notice on an available legal remedy would not be a reason which would justify the appeal lodged outside the prescribed time-limit to be considered as if it was lodged in time. That is so because the party who has not been given any instructions on a legal remedy and who wishes to lodge a legal remedy against the decision may do so in the manner and within the time-limit prescribed by law. Ignorance of the law is to the detriment of one who claims to not know that law.”
In its decision no. Pž-7138/14-3 of 14 November 2014 the High Commercial Court’s held:
“The information notice on a legal remedy is not an integral part of ... the court decision (...). Therefore, the fact that the contested decision does not contain an instruction on a legal remedy does not mean that it is incorrect or unlawful only because of that.”
In its decision no. Rev 656/13-2 of 29 October 2013 the Supreme Court held:
“The appellant in the appeal on points of law points out that the judgment did not contain an information notice on a legal remedy, and that because of the absence of [such notice], the plaintiff was prevented from presenting her case in court, which constituted a serious breach of civil procedure.
The fact that the parties were provided with a certified copy of the supplementary judgment without the instruction on the right to appeal ... does not prevent the judgment from becoming final. The right to appeal against the first-instance judgment is recognised not only by the Civil Procedure Act (...) but is also a right guaranteed by the Constitution. Therefore, the plaintiff, for whom the supplementary judgment was served on her advocate, could appeal against that judgment, notwithstanding the fact that the court failed to include in the judgment an instruction on the right to appeal...”
COMPLAINTS
42. The applicant complained under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention that the seizure of the full amount of her pension had been unlawful.
43. She also complained under Article 13 of the Convention read in conjunction with Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 that her appeal of 2 November 2011 against the seizure of the entire amount of her pension had been declared inadmissible as being lodged out of time because the domestic courts had wrongly informed her about the remedies available in that regard (see paragraphs 17, 21 and 25 and 27 above).
THE LAW
44. The applicant complained that the seizure of the full amount her pension had been unlawful under domestic law and in breach of her right to the peaceful enjoyment of her possessions. She relied on Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention which reads as follows:
“Every natural or legal person is entitled to the peaceful enjoyment of his possessions. No one shall be deprived of his possessions except in the public interest and subject to the conditions provided for by law and by the general principles of international law.
The preceding provisions shall not, however, in any way impair the right of a State to enforce such laws as it deems necessary to control the use of property in accordance with the general interest or to secure the payment of taxes or other contributions or penalties.”
45. In relation to the above complaint, the applicant also submitted under Article 13 of the Convention that, because the domestic courts had wrongly informed her about the remedies available against the seizure of the entire amount of her pension, her appeal had been declared inadmissible (see paragraphs 17, 21 and 25 and 27 above), which had amounted to a violation of her right to an effective remedy.
46. Given that the safeguards of Article 6 § 1 in respect of a “fair hearing”, implying the full panoply of a judicial procedure, are stricter than, and absorb, those of Article 13 (see Kudła v. Poland [GC], no. 30210/96, § 146, ECHR 2000 XI), the Court, being master of the characterisation to be given in law to the facts of the case (see Guerra and Others v. Italy, 19 February 1998, § 44, Reports of Judgments and Decisions 1998‑I, and Radomilja and Others v. Croatia [GC], nos. 37685/10 and 22768/12, § 124, 20 March 2018), considers that this complaint is to be examined under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention as an access-to-court complaint. The relevant part of that Article reads as follows:
“In the determination of his civil rights and obligations ... everyone is entitled to a ... hearing ... by [a] ... tribunal ...”The parties’ submissions
47. The Government argued that the applicant had not complied with the six-month rule, that she had not exhausted domestic remedies, that she had not suffered a significant disadvantage and that, in any event, the application was manifestly ill-founded.
48. Among many other arguments, the Government emphasised that the applicant had failed to lodge an appeal against the writ of execution of 8 December 2009 within the time-limit prescribed by law. In their view there was no good reason which could justify the fact that she had remained passive from 18 March 2010, when the writ had been served on her, until 2 November 2011 when her advocate, hired on 2 May 2011, lodged the appeal together with the application for restoration of the proceedings into the status quo ante (see paragraphs 17 and 20-21 above).
49. The applicant replied that it had taken her advocate from the end of May to the end of September 2011 to review the case because it had been very complex, and the case file had often not been available for inspection. Moreover, her advocate had had to consult the case files of the related proceedings. For example, it was only in October 2011 that her advocate had obtained information from the Croatian Pension Fund that one third of her pension had indeed been seized in the first set of enforcement proceedings (see paragraph 6 above). In the period before she had hired an advocate the applicant could not take steps to protect her rights because she had been impecunious, old and in poor health.The Court’s assessment
50. The relevant principles emerging from the Court’s case-law concerning the right of access to a court are summarised in Zubac v. Croatia (GC], no. 40160/12, §§ 76-86, 5 April 2018.
51. The Court reiterates that rules governing the formal steps to be taken and the time-limits to be complied with in lodging an appeal are aimed at ensuring a proper administration of justice and compliance, in particular, with the principle of legal certainty (see, for example, Miragall Escolano and Others v. Spain, no. 38366/97, §§ 33 and 36, ECHR 2000-I, and Běleš and Others v. the Czech Republic, no. 47273/99, § 49, ECHR 2002‑IX).
52. In the present case, the writ of execution by seizure of funds in the applicant’s bank accounts of 8 December 2009 was served on the applicant on 18 March 2010 (see paragraph 17 above). The writ included no information notice about legal remedies available against it, even though such notice was required under domestic law (see paragraphs 17 and 34 above). The applicant claimed that this – together with earlier wrong information notice regarding remedies available against the decision of 20 October 2009 (see paragraph 13 above) – was the reason why she had not appealed the writ within the statutory time-limit of eight days (see section 11 of the Enforcement Act cited at paragraph 32 above). She did so only on 2 November 2011, after she had hired an advocate (see paragraph 21 above).
53. As a consequence, on 11 December 2012 the Zagreb Municipal Court declared the applicant’s appeal inadmissible as being out of time (see paragraph 25 above). That decision was upheld by the Varaždin County Court on 16 December 2013 (see paragraph 27 above).
54. The Court has held that, where inaccurate information about time‑limits has been supplied by the authorities, the domestic courts must take sufficient account of the particular circumstances of the case and not apply the relevant rules and case-law too rigidly (see Gajtani v. Switzerland, no. 43730/07, §§ 69 and 71, 9 September 2014, and Clavien v. Switzerland, no. 16730/15, § 27, 12 September 2017).
55. In those cases, the applicants’ appeals were declared inadmissible because they were lodged within the time-limits indicated by domestic courts which were wrong as they were longer than those provided by the relevant legislation. Such a situation cannot arise under Croatian law given the case-law of Croatian courts (see paragraph 39 above).
56. The present case concerns a different situation where the contested decision, namely the writ of execution of 8 December 2009, contained no information on legal remedies available against it, which was contrary to domestic law (see paragraphs 17 and 34 above).
57. In respect of such situations the domestic courts consistently held that, if a remedy was available against a certain decision, the absence of information concerning such a remedy could not justify non-compliance with the statutory time-limit for lodging the available remedy (see paragraph 41 above).
58. Their case-law seems to be fully in line with the Court’s position on the matter. In particular, in cases where the impugned decisions made no reference to the available remedies, the Court has held that Article 6 § 1 did not go so far as to require the courts to indicate in the text of their decisions the detailed arrangements and time-limits for appealing against them (see Avotiņš v. Latvia [GC], no. 17502/07, § 123, 23 May 2016; Klein and Others v. Germany, nos. 10138/11 and 3 others, § 98, 6 April 2017, and Société Guerin Automobiles v. the 15 States of the European Union (dec.), no. 51717/99, 4 July 2000). The fact that such requirement might be provided under domestic law, which is laudable in so far as it affords an additional safeguard facilitating the exercise of litigants’ rights, is of no relevance. It is therefore up to the applicants themselves, after becoming aware of the impugned decision, to enquire, if need be with appropriate advice, as to the remedies available (see Avotiņš, cited above, §§ 123-124).
59. The Court has rarely found justifiable the non-observance by the applicants of time-limits set forth by domestic law where, as in the present case (see paragraph 17 above), they were properly notified of the contested decision. It did so only in very exceptional circumstances (see Assunção Chaves v. Portugal, no. 61226/08, §§ 70-88, 31 January 2012, and Gajtani, cited above, §§ 65-77). In the Court’s view, such exceptional circumstances do not arise in the present case.
60. In this regard the Court first notes that, even though the enforcement proceedings in question concerning garnishment of the applicant’s pension were of undeniable importance for her, they were nevertheless limited to pecuniary issues (see Clavien, cited above, § 26, and contrast with Gajtani, cited above, § 75, which concerned proceedings for the return of children under the Hague Convention on International Child Abduction, and Assunção Chaves, cited above, § 82, which concerned proceedings for withdrawal of the applicant’s parental authority).
61. The Court further notes that:
- the right of appeal is a right guaranteed by the Croatian Constitution and may only exceptionally be excluded (see paragraph 30 above),
- the relevant enforcement legislation provided that an appeal was always available against the first-instance decisions (including writs of execution) unless the law provided otherwise (see paragraph 32 above),
- the eight-day time-limit for lodging an appeal against writs of execution was provided by the relevant domestic law and has remained unchanged since 1978 (see paragraph 32 above and Clavien, cited above, § 25, and contrast with Gajtani, cited above, § 65).
62. Lastly, in cases such as the present one where procedural errors have occurred both on the side of the applicants and that of the relevant authorities, notably the courts, the Court has held that it should be established whether the applicants were represented during the proceedings and whether they and/or their legal representatives displayed the requisite diligence in pursuing the relevant procedural actions (see Zubac, cited above, §§ 91 and 93). The Court stressed that procedural rights usually go hand in hand with procedural obligations and that litigants were required to show diligence in complying with the procedural steps relating to their case (ibid., § 93).
63. In this connection it cannot but be noted that:
- it took the applicant more than six years after the second set of enforcement proceedings had been instituted, and more than a year after the writ of execution had been served on her, to hire an advocate (see paragraphs 8, 17 and 20 above),
- it took the applicant’s advocate more than six months after she had been hired to lodge an appeal against the writ (see paragraphs 20-21 above).
64. It is true that the applicant was not legally represented in the period before 20 April 2011 (see paragraphs 8-19 above), which may have made it more difficult for her to orient herself in the proceedings. However, there is nothing in the case file suggesting that the applicant’s decision not to seek assistance of an advocate was a matter potentially engaging responsibility of the State (see, mutatis mutandis, Karakutsya v. Ukraine, no. 18986/06, § 59, 16 February 2017). As already stated above (see paragraph 62 above), it is incumbent on the interested parties to display special diligence in the defence of their interests and to take the necessary steps to apprise themselves of the developments in the proceedings (ibid., § 53 and the cases cited therein).
65. The applicant’s lack of diligence is further demonstrated by the fact that she did not contest the earlier writ of execution of 27 June 2005 even though that writ had also indicated that it was to be carried out by, inter alia, the seizure of funds in her bank accounts (see paragraphs 10-11 above). This means that she could have prevented the situation complained of, namely the seizure of the full amount of her pension, much earlier.
66. As regards the conduct of the applicant’s advocate (see paragraph 63 above), the Court reiterates that errors committed by the applicants’ representatives do not in principle engage the responsibility of the authorities under the Convention (see Gajtani, cited above, § 71, and Clavien, cited above, § 23).
67. In view of these considerations (see paragraphs 62-65 above), it cannot be said that the applicant and her advocate demonstrated the requisite diligence in following the proceedings complained of. In this connection the Court notes that the applicant’s argument that she had not been able to react earlier to protect her rights due to her health condition (see paragraph 49 above) is not corroborated by any evidence. Moreover, the applicant never raised that argument before the domestic courts (see paragraphs see 21-24, 26 and 28 above). The Court therefore does not find objectively justifiable her failure to lodge an appeal and an application for restoration of the proceedings into the status quo ante within the statutory time-limits.
68. The Court thus considers that by declaring inadmissible, on the basis of applicable law, the applicant’s appeal and the application for restoration of the proceedings into the status quo ante lodged more than year and a half after the writ of execution of 8 December 2009 had been served on her (see paragraphs 17, 21, 25 and 27 above), the domestic courts did not act too rigidly nor did they restrict the applicant’s right of access to court in a manner incompatible with Article 6 of the Convention.
69. It follows that the applicant’s access-to-court complaint is inadmissible under Article 35 § 3 (a) of the Convention as manifestly ill‑founded and must be rejected, pursuant to Article 35 § 4 thereof.
70. In view of this conclusion, it further follows that in lodging the available remedies against the said writ of execution the applicant failed to comply with the procedural requirements of the domestic law, and that her complaint under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention is therefore inadmissible under Article 35 § 1 of the Convention for non-exhaustion of domestic remedies and that it must also be rejected pursuant to Article 35 § 4.
71. For these reasons (see paragraphs 50-70 above), the Court does not find it necessary to examine the Government’s remaining inadmissibility objections (see paragraph 47 above).
For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,
Declares the application inadmissible.
Done in English and notified in writing on 15 April 2021.
Attila TeplánErik Wennerström
Acting Deputy RegistrarPresident
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy