SECOND SECTION

DECISION

Application no. 47450/07 by Zef KARAQ I against Serbia

The European Court of Human Rights (Second Section), sitting on 25 May 2010 as a Chamber composed of:

Françoise Tulkens , President, Danutė Jočienė , Dragoljub Popović , András Sajó , Nona Tsotsoria , Kristina Pardalos , Guido Raimondi , judges, and Françoise Elens-Passos , Deputy Section Registrar ,

Having regard to the above application lodged on 24 October 2007,

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

PROCEDURE

The application was lodged by Mr Zef Karaq i , who was born in 1941 and lives in Đ akovica . He wa s represented before the Court by Mr F. Sedaj , a lawyer practising in Pri ština . The Serbian Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent, Mr S. Carić .

The applicant complained under Article 6 of the Convention and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 about the continuing refusal of the respondent State to release his foreign currency savings.

The applicant ' s complaints under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1, together with a question under Article 14 of the Convention, were communicated to the Government, who submitted their observations on admissibility and merits. The observations were forwarded to the applicant, who was invited to submit his own observations. No reply was received to the Registry ' s letter.

By letter dated 17 December 2009 , sent by registered post, the applicant ' s representative was notified that the period allowed for submission of the applicant ' s observations had expired on 18 November 2009 and that no extension of time had been requested. The representative ' s attention was drawn to Article 37 § 1 (a) of the Convention, which provides that the Court may strike a case out of its list whe n the circumstances lead to the conclusion that the applicant does not intend to pursue the application. The applicant ' s representative received this letter by 13 January 2010, when he wrote back to the Registry claiming that he had been waiting for instructions from the applicant, and that he expected to be able to reply by the end of January 2010. However, n o further communication has been recei ved from either the applicant or his representative.

THE LAW

The Court considers that, in these circumstances, the applicant may be regarded as no longer wishing to pursue his application, within the meaning of Article 37 § 1 (a) of the Convention. Furthermore, in accordance with Article 37 § 1 in fine , the Court finds no special circumstances regarding respect for human rights as defined in the Convention and its Protocols which require the continued examination of the case.

In view of the above, it is appropriate to strike the case out of the list.

For these reasons, the Court unanimously

Decides to strike the application out of its list of cases.

F rançoise Elens - Passos Françoise Tulkens Deputy Registrar President