VASILEV AND SOCIETY OF THE REPRESSED MACEDONIANS IN BULGARIA VICTIMS OF THE COMMUNIST TERROR v. BULGARIA and 9 other applications

Published on 26 February 2024

THIRD SECTION

Application no. 2212/20
Stoyan Gerasimov Vasilev and Society of the Repressed Macedonians in Bulgaria Victims of the Communist Terror against Bulgaria
and 9 other applications
(see appended list)
communicated on 7 February 2024

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASES

1.  These ten applications concern ten refusals of the Bulgarian Registry Agency, dating from the period between June 2019 and July 2023, to enter four associations – Society of the Repressed Macedonians in Bulgaria Victims of the Communist Terror (seven refusals), Civil Initiative for the Recognition of a Macedonian National Minority in Bulgaria (one refusal), Macedonian Club for Ethnic Tolerance in Bulgaria (one refusal) and Macedonian Cultural Club Nikola Vaptsarov-Blagoevgrad (one refusal) – in the register of non-profit organisations kept by that Agency. By section 6(1) of the Bulgarian Non-Profit Legal Persons Act 2000, such registration is a prerequisite for a non-profit organisation to acquire legal personality.

2.  All of those four associations advocate the view that there exists an oppressed Macedonian minority in Bulgaria and seek to protect its rights.

3.  The chairpersons of the respective associations sought judicial review of each of the ten refusals, but the competent courts upheld all of them. In all ten cases, the final court of appeal was the Sofia Court of Appeal. In some cases, it pointed to formal deficiencies in the respective association’s registration documents. In other cases, the court stated that the respective association’s aims, as set out in its articles of association, implied that there existed an oppressed Macedonian ethnic minority in Bulgaria, and held that the creation of an association having such aims was directed against the unity of the nation and was meant to stir up ethnic hatred, contrary to the prohibition in Article 44 § 2 of the Bulgarian Constitution. In one case, the court found that the realisation of those aims would result in discrimination against all people who did not share the purported ethnic identity of the association’s founders. In several cases, the court also held that the association’s aims, as set out in its articles of association, were political, whereas by Article 12 § 2 of the Constitution associations could not pursue political aims or carry out political activities.

4.  In eight applications (nos. 2212/20, 32539/20, 38209/21, 38218/21, 10224/22, 22314/23, 34564/23 and 41052/23), the associations and their respective chairpersons complain under Article 11 of the Convention of the respective refusals to register the associations.

5.  In each of the ten applications, they also complain under Article 14 of the Convention taken together with Article 11 of the Convention that those refusals were motivated – some implicitly and some overtly – by the Macedonian ethnic identity of the respective association’s founders.

6.  In one application (no. 41052/23), they further complain under Article 18 of the Convention that the real reason for the one of the refusals to register the association – which the Sofia Court of Appeal upheld on the basis that there were formal deficiencies in the registration documents – was to deny the Macedonian ethnic identity of its founders.

QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES

1.  Has there been a breach of the applicants’ right to freedom of association, contrary to Article 11 of the Convention? In particular, were the ten refusals to register the four associations “prescribed by law” and “necessary in a democratic society” for the attainment of one or more of the aims set out in Article 11 § 2, in the light of, in particular, the reasons given to uphold those refusals by the final court of appeal hearing the legal challenges against them – the Sofia Court of Appeal (see, mutatis mutandis, United Macedonian Organisation Ilinden-PIRIN and Others v. Bulgaria (no. 2), nos. 41561/07 and 20972/08, § 80, 18 October 2011)?

2.  Did the refusal to register Society of the Repressed Macedonians in Bulgaria Victims of the Communist Terror at issue in application no. 41052/23 pursue a purpose other than those envisaged by Article 11 of the Convention, contrary to Article 18 of the Convention?

APPENDIX

[1]  Mr Vasilev says that he is a national of both Bulgaria and North Macedonia.