NRDO

Rodoljub Etinski, The Paris Climate Agreement and Human Rights

Abstract: The study starts by discussing the manner in which the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change recognizes the injustice inherent to the relationship between those responsible for and those most affected by climate change. This is followed by a review of the distribution of the burden of reduction of greenhouse gas emissions among developed countries according to the Kyoto Protocol, from 2008 to 2012, and according to the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement. The issue of the impact of climate change on human rights is discussed in connection with the reports, panel, and resolutions of the United Nations Human Rights Council, and the December 4th, 2015, Draft of the Paris Climate Agreement. Section III of the study analyses the international environmental recourse available to individuals, including the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation (14 September 1993), the Aarhus Convention (25 June 1998), and the 1999 Protocol on Water and Health to the 1992 Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes. The study argues that a human rights advisory body would be necessary for proper implementation of the Paris Agreement. Individuals and NGOs should have a right to raise the issue of compliance to international human rights standards of the climate change related actions of the parties to the Agreement before an expert body competent to consider such issues.

Keywords: climate change, human rights, advisory body, Kyoto Protocol, the North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, Aarhus Convention 

Ioana Şoldea, Complaint about the protraction of proceedings and Complaint about length of criminal proceedings -“effective remedies”?

Abstract: The remedy required by Article 13 of the European Convention on Human Rights must be effective in practice as well as in law, in the sense either of preventing the alleged violation or of providing adequate redress for any violation that has already occurred. Articles 522 to 526 of the New Romanian Code of Civil Procedure, which came into force on 15^th of February 2013, introduce a remedy aimed at expediting excessively lengthy proceedings, namely a “complaint about the protraction of proceedings”. As regards the New Romanian Code of Criminal Procedure, which came into force on 1^st of February 2014, it introduces a remedy, namely a “complaint about length of criminal proceedings”. The European Court of Human Rights reiterates that an effective remedy must be available both for proceedings that have already ended and for those still pending. At the same time, taking into consideration the importance of the matter to the applicant, the time periods required by Article 488¹ paragraph 3 of the New Romanian Code of Criminal Procedure seem to be excessive.

Keywords: effective remedy, optimal and predictable time, reasonable time, complaint about the protraction of proceedings, complaint about length of criminal proceedings, New Romanian Code of Civil Procedure, New Romanian Code of Criminal Procedure, European Convention on Human Rights,  European Court of Human Rights

Valentin Constantin, The Russian Federation’s constitutionality exception 

Abstract: The article reviews the main arguments of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation in its decision from 14 July 2015 on its right to review the decisions of the ECtHR. The review process starts at the request of courts and state authorities tasked with implementing the decisions of the Court, when these conflict with the Russian Constitution. According to the author, this ex post constitutionality review is equivalent to a constitutionality exception. This measure, through the uncertainty it creates regarding the implementation of treaties, is detrimental to the development of international law. In this particular case though, its use appears to be the result of a certain activism on the part of the ECtHR. The latter seems to not fully evaluate the possible consequences of its “evolutive” interpretation of the Convention. Two decisions of the European Court are mentioned in support of this view: Konstantin Markin v. Russia from 22.03.2012 and Anchugov and Gladkov v. Russia from 04.07.2013.

Keywords: Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation, European Court of Human Rights, Konstantin Markin v. Russia, Anchugov and Gladkov v. Russia, constitutionality review

Gabriel Andreescu, Varieties of Multiculturalism and the Canonic Model. The Need for Conceptual Boundaries

Abstract: The article highlights the multiplicity of meanings assigned to the concept of “multiculturalism” by various researchers, politicians and journalists. The author argues for the resulting need to provide more coherence in the use of the term within the academic community. He proposes to that end a “canonic model” of multiculturalism, understood as the balance and fairness in inter-ethnic relations presupposing the acknowledgement of the importance of inclusion as well as of the need to privacy of ethno-cultural communities. The author defines “multiculturalist measures” as those normative actions which have the double function of ensuring both inclusion and group privacy, to be distinguished from inclusion-only or privacy-only measures. The article lists privacy-type measures like legal exemption, the establishment of private institutions, or the establishment of bodies of public law. Among measures for the inclusion of ethno-cultural communities, the article analyses efforts to ensure the conditions for inclusion, effective participation of national minorities in public life, anti-discrimination policy, empowerment of the persons belonging to ethnic, racial, national and linguistic or religious groups, and inclusion of the groups as collective entities. Based on these concepts, the article discusses the distinction between liberal and non-liberal multiculturalism.

Keywords: multiculturalism, interculturalism, canonic model, group privacy, inclusion, anti-discrimination, liberal multiculturalism, non-liberal multiculturalism