Information Note on the Court’s case-law 34

September 2001

Bakarić v. Croatia (dec.) - 48077/99

Decision 13.9.2001 [Section IV]

Article 6

Civil proceedings

Article 6-1

Civil rights and obligations

Constitutional proceedings directed against laws on which decisions based rather than decisions themselves: Article 6 inapplicable

The applicant served in the Yugoslav People’s Army (hereafter YPA) until his retirem ent in 1983. He received a military pension until the dissolution of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1991. In December 1992, the Croatian Social Security Fund assessed the applicant’s pension to 63.22% of the amount he had received in December 1991. Following this decrease of his pension, the applicant unsuccessfully instituted proceedings in the Administrative Court. Instead of lodging a constitutional complaint against the Administrative Court’s decision, the applicant lodged one against the laws re gulating the pension rights of former officers of the YPA. The proceedings were closed when a new law on the matter was enacted. The applicant lodged a further constitutional complaint against the new law. However, these proceedings ended with a new law on the pension rights of former officers of the YPA.

Inadmissible under Article 6 § 1: After unsuccessfully instituting administrative proceedings, the applicant could have lodged a constitutional complaint directly against the decisions reducing his pension . The Constitutional Court would have had the opportunity to examine the dispute regarding the amount of the applicant’s pension and, considering the pecuniary nature of the issue, Article 6 would have applied. However, the applicant chose to direct his co nstitutional complaints against the relevant laws themselves. Therefore, the Constitutional Court could not examine the impugned decisions reducing his pension but could only rule in the abstract on the constitutionality of the laws on which the decisions were based. These proceedings were thus not decisive for the determination of his civil rights and Article 6 did not apply: incompatible ratione materiae .

© Council of Europe/European Court of Human Rights This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.

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