SECOND SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 45909/20
Mato TOPALOVIĆ
against Croatia
The European Court of Human Rights (Second Section), sitting on 27 May 2025 as a Committee composed of:
Jovan Ilievski, President,
Péter Paczolay,
Davor Derenčinović, judges,
and Dorothee von Arnim, Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to:
the application (no. 45909/20) against the Republic of Croatia lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 8 October 2020 by a Croatian national, Mr Mato Topalović (“the applicant”), who was born in 1973, lives in Beravci and was represented by Mr J. Stanić, a lawyer practising in Slavonski Brod;
the decision to give notice of the complaint concerning access to a court to the Croatian Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, Ms Š. Stažnik, and to declare inadmissible the remainder of the application;
the parties’ observations;
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE
1. The application concerns the decision of the Supreme Court to declare inadmissible the applicant’s civil action for compensation for injuries sustained in a work-related accident, because he had failed to report his claim in pre-bankruptcy settlement proceedings (postupak predstečajne nagodbe) opened against the defendant company.
2. By a decision of 6 February 2020, notified on the applicant’s representative on 13 February 2020, the Constitutional Court dismissed the applicant’s constitutional complaint against the Supreme Court’s decision.
3. Before the Court the applicant complained that the Supreme Court’s decision declaring his civil action inadmissible had been in breach of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention.
THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT
4. The Court notes that in the proceedings complained of the final domestic decision, within the meaning of Article 35 § 1 of the Convention, was adopted on 6 February 2020 and served on the applicant’s representative on 13 February 2020 (see paragraph 2 above) whereas he lodged his application with the Court on 8 October 2020, that is, more than six months later.
5. While the Government did not raise an objection based on non‑compliance with the six-month time-limit applicable at the relevant time, the Court reiterates that this is an issue which it must examine of its own motion (see, for example, Fu Quan, s.r.o. v. the Czech Republic [GC], no. 24827/14, § 168, 1 June 2023, and the cases cited therein).
6. The Court is mindful that on 16 March and 9 April 2020, in view of the global Covid-19 pandemic, exceptional measures (including in respect of the calculation of the six-month time-limit) were announced by the President of the Court (see, for further details, Saakashvili v. Georgia (dec.), nos. 6232/20 and 22394/20, §§ 46-59, 1 March 2022). The Court found that those measures were applicable to applications in which a calendar six-month period either started to run or was due to expire at any time between 16 March and 15 June 2020; in that case, the six-month rule under Article 35 § 1 of the Convention should be exceptionally considered to have been suspended for three calendar months in total (ibid., § 58; Kitanovska and Barbulovski v. North Macedonia, no. 53030/19, § 40, 9 May 2023; and Masse v. France (dec.), no. 47506/20, §§ 23-29, 25 March 2025).
7. In the applicant’s case the six-month time-limit started to run on 13 February 2020 and expired on 13 August 2020. Those dates do not fall within the above-mentioned period (16 March-15 June 2020), which coincided with the most critical phase of the pandemic.
8. Therefore, the exceptional three-month suspension does not apply to the applicant’s situation (see Masse, cited above, §§ 30-32, and Kitanovska and Barbulovski, cited above, § 40).
9. It follows that, in the absence of exceptional circumstances linked to the particular situation of the applicant (see Masse, cited above, § 31), the present application is inadmissible under Article 35 § 1 of the Convention for non-compliance with the six‑month rule. It must therefore be rejected pursuant to Article 35 § 4 thereof.
For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,
Declares the application inadmissible.
Done in English and notified in writing on 19 June 2025.
Dorothee von Arnim Jovan Ilievski
Deputy Registrar President