The European Court of Human Rights (Second Section), sitting on 27 September 2016 as a Committee composed of: Valeriu Griţco, President, Stéphanie Mourou-Vikström, Georges Ravarani, judges, and Hasan Bakırcı, Deputy Section Registrar, Having regard to the above applications lodged on the various dates indicated in the appended table, Having deliberated, decides as follows: THE FACTS 1. A list of the applicants is set out in the appendix. The Turkish Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent. A. The circumstances of the cases 2. The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows. 3. On various dates, the applicants initiated actions before various civil courts or criminal proceedings were brought against them. The details of the applications appear in the table below. 2 SÖNMEZER v. TURKEY AND OTHER APPLICATIONS DECISION B....
SECOND SECTION DECISION Application no. 26256/06 Mahmure SÖNMEZER against Turkey and 5 other applications (see list appended) The European Court of Human Rights (Second Section), sitting on 27 September 2016 as a Committee composed of: Valeriu Griţco, President, Stéphanie Mourou-Vikström, Georges Ravarani, judges, and Hasan Bakırcı, Deputy Section Registrar, Having regard to the above applications lodged on the various dates indicated in the appended table, Having deliberated, decides as follows: THE FACTS 1. A list of the applicants is set out in the appendix. The Turkish Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent. A. The circumstances of the cases 2. The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows. 3. On various dates, the applicants initiated actions before various civil courts or criminal proceedings were brought against them. The details of the applications appear in the table below.
2 SÖNMEZER v. TURKEY AND OTHER APPLICATIONS DECISION B. Relevant domestic law 4. A description of the domestic law may be found in Turgut and Others v. Turkey (dec.), no. 4860/09, 26 March 2013; Demiroğlu v. Turkey (dec.), no. 56125/10, 4 June 2013; and Yıldız and Yanak v. Turkey (dec.), no. 44013/07, 27 May 2014. COMPLAINTS 5. The applicants complained under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention that the proceedings before the national courts had not been concluded within a reasonable time. 6. The applicants submitted other complaints under Articles 6, 8, 13, 14 of the Convention and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention. THE LAW 7. Having regard to the similar subject matter of the applications, the Court finds it appropriate to examine them jointly in a single decision. A. Alleged violation of the Article 6 § 1 of the Convention 8. The applicants complained that the length of the proceedings had been incompatible with the “reasonable time” requirement laid down in Article 6 § 1 of the Convention. 9. The Government noted that pursuant to Law no. 6384 a new Compensation Commission had been established to deal with applications concerning the length of proceedings and the non-execution of judgments. They further noted that the competence of the Compensation Commission was subsequently enlarged by a decree adopted on 16 March 2014 to examine complaints relating to, among other things, the alleged loss of value of the amount of the expropriation compensation due to the effects of inflation and the length of the proceedings. Accordingly, they maintained that the applicant had not exhausted domestic remedies, as he had not made any application to the Compensation Commission. 10. The Court observes that, as pointed out by the Government, a new domestic remedy has been established in Turkey following the application of the pilot judgment procedure in the case of Ümmühan Kaplan v. Turkey (no. 24240/07, 20 March 2012). Subsequently, in its decision in the case of Yıldız and Y...