Communicated on 30 September 2016

FIRST SECTION

Application no 46889/16 Erdjan BEKIR and Others against the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia lodged on 11 August 2016

STATEMENT OF FACTS

The fifty-three applicants are Macedonian nationals of Roma ethnic origin. Twenty-nine of the m are children, including one infant , o ne applicant is a pregnant woman , one applicant has a child with a disability and three applicants are men whose wives are pregnant. They are represented before the Court by the European Roma Rights Centre, a non-governmental organisation based in Budapest.

A list of the applicants is set out in the appendix.

The circumstances of the case

The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant s , may be summarised as follows.

1. Background information

The applicants, together with other Roma families (around thirty-one family or one hundred twenty-one individuals), have been living in a settlement known as “Polygon”, below the Kale fortress in Skopje (near the centre of the city). They allege that most of the families have been living on the site between five and nine years.

The applicants did not have any tenure to the land . The land where the settlement is located used to be State-owned. In 2011 , the land had been privatised and sold to a private company-investor.

Th e applicants have been living in improvised and makeshift dwellings made out of available material such as paper, cardboard, wood and plastic bags . The living conditions in the settlement had been poor. The only water sourc e had been a single water pump.

The applicants ’ source of living is the collection of scrap iron and plastic. They allege that they have occasionally applied for social housing, but have always been refused.

Over the years, the authorities have occasionally undertaken activities for cleaning up of the site of the settlement and have removed and/or destroyed the applicants ’ homes and property. However, the applicants and the other individuals living in the settlement have returned to the site and have rebuilt their homes out of the available materials.

2. The demolition

On 11 July 2016 the Inspectorate of the City of Skopje requested the Public utility enterprise to clean up the site of the applicants ’ settlement because it was established that the site had become a waste dumping ground, contrary to section 14 and 18 of the Public Cleanliness Act ( Закон за јавна чистота ) .

The applicants state that they have never re ceived any formal notice of this decision, although some of the applicants have received warnings that they should remove their belongings from the site.

The applicants submit that on the morning of 1 August 2016, the water pump that had served as the only source of water for the settlement was destroyed by the police.

Later on during the day, bulldozers arrived and demolished the applicants ’ homes and parts of their belongings (documents, clothes and furniture).

3. Post-demolition situation

The applicants submit that after the demolition of their dwellings some of them have been approached by the Welfare Centre and have received informal (oral) offers for accommodation in the shelter centre in Č i č ino selo . Those who have been approached have refused the offers to be housed in Čičino selo due to security concerns and poor living conditions in the centre. They state that no other alternative accommodation was offered to them.

The applicants note that the conditions in the centre are poor. They submitted a 2013 report of the Macedonian Ombudsman ’ s Office according to which the living conditions in Čičino Selo had been bad, with insufficient supply of food and food storage facilities, low level of hygiene, problems with waste collection, access to health care and education (in particular for Romani children) and safety issues. On 5 August 2016 several of the applicants visited the shelter and confirmed these poor conditions.

They further note that that they refuse to be housed in the centre on grounds of security concerns. Three of the applicants have stayed in the shelter in the past and have reported problems related to interethnic violence between the Roma and the local ethnic Albanian population. They submit that the security personnel had failed to protect the Roma residents of the shelter.

Lastly the applicants submitted that the shelter centre in Č i č ino selo lacks the capacity to house all of the applicants. Following a fire in 2015, the centr e was not fully operational. Only four rooms were available to house more than fifty applicants. The applicants assert ed that according to their information the size of the rooms in the shelter centre is 13m 2 and there was a danger of overcrowding should a family of four be housed in one room.

The applicants continue to reside on the site of their former settlement. They are provided with support by non-governmental organisations and the Red Cross.

They state that many of the m suffer from health problems (such as bronchitis and skin conditions) as a result of the poor living conditions. The children have not received immunization and the female applicants of child-bearing age were concerned that their reproductive health is at risk.

The applicants claim ed that they are being constantly monitored by the employees of the local authorities to prevent them from trying to rebuild their dwellings.

COMPLAINTS

The applicant s complain under Article 3 of the Conve n tion that the demolition of their dwellings on 1 August 2016 and the failure to provide them with alternative accommodation or any other form of support amounted to a treatment contrary to Article 3 . In this connection they allege that they have been living since 1 August 2016 in conditions of extreme poverty, without food, drinking water or sanitation, in degrading conditions that are dangerous for the health and well-being of the applicants. They also complain that it was traumatizing for the children to witness the demolition of their homes and their parents ’ powerlessness.

The applicants also complain that by demolishing their makeshift dwellings and leaving them homeless in conditions of extreme destitution, the national authorities have violated their rights under Article 8 of the Convention. In particular, they complain that the demolition of their dwellings had been unlawful and disproportional, in particular that the legislation under which the actions were undertaken lacked the required procedural safeguards. They also complain that the national authorities failed to provide them with alternative accommodation.

Lastly, t he y complain under Article 13 in conjunction with Article 3 and 8 of the Convention that there had been no available remedy with automatic suspensive effect before the demolition of their dwellings took place.

QUESTIONS

1. Have the applicants exhausted any domestic remedies in relation to their complaints under Articles 3 and 8 before applying to the Court, as required by Article 35 § 1 of the Convention?

2. Has the suffering caused by watching the demolition of their dwellings of 1 August 2016 reached the threshold of Article 3 of the Convention? If so, have the applicants been subjected to treatment contrary to Article 3 of the Convention on this account?

3. Have the applicants been subjected to inhuman or degrading treatment, in breach of Article 3 of the Convention after the demolition of their dwellings on 1 August 2016?

4. Did the authorities respect the applicants ’ right to protection of their home as well as private and family life under Article 8 of the Convention? D i d the demolition of the applicants ’ dwellings amount to an interference with the applicants ’ rights under Article 8 of the Co nvention? If so, was that interference “in accordance with the law” an d necessary in terms of Article 8 § 2? Were the national authorities under a positive obligation under Article 8 to provide the applicants with adequate shelter in good time? If yes, did they breach this obligation?

5 . Did the applicants have at their disposal effective domestic remedies for their Convention complaints under Articles 3 and 8, as required under Article 13 of the Convention?

APPENDIX