Legal summary

December 2022

Tonchev and Others v. Bulgaria - 56862/15

Judgment 13.12.2022 [Section III]

Article 9

Article 9-1

Freedom of religion

Information circulated to schools by the municipal authority containing pejorative and hostile remarks about the Evangelical denomination to which the applicant associations and pastors belonged: violation

Facts – In 2008 a municipal authority circulated a letter to the headteachers of the city’s schools, to be brought to the attention of all pupils. The letter was signed by the deputy mayor and co-signed by the head of the local committee on combating juvenile anti-social behaviour and by a police officer, and was accompanied by an information notice. The documents referred to certain religious movements, including the evangelical movement to which the applicants – two religious associations and two pastors – belonged, as “dangerous religious sects” which “contravene[d] Bulgarian legislation, citizens’ rights and public order” and whose meetings placed participants at risk of “mental disorders”.

The municipal authority’s press office issued a press release with the heading “Mayor appeals for vigilance in the face of renewed activity of religious missionaries around the Easter celebrations”. A number of media articles, both in print form and online, reported on the story.

A large number of schools informed the municipal authority that teachers had passed on the information to their pupils during lessons or in specially arranged debating sessions.

The applicants brought judicial proceedings against the municipal authority and the Interior Ministry before the Administrative Court and the Commission for Protection against Discrimination. Their claims were rejected.

Law – Article 9:

(a) Whether there was interference – The applicants’ complaints did not relate to the media articles reporting on the municipal authority’s initiative, but only to the actions of the authorities such as the municipal authority and the departments of the Interior Ministry.

The language used in the circular letter and the information notice could indeed be perceived as pejorative and hostile. The documents in question had been circulated by the municipal authority of the city in which the applicant associations and the individual applicants carried out their activities. The had been sent to all the city’s schools, which were asked to bring the documents to pupils’ attention and to report back to the municipal authority on how the information had been presented and the children’s reactions. In those circumstances, and although the measures complained of had not directly restricted the right of the applicant pastors or their fellow religious adherents to manifest their religion through worship and practice, the Court considered that the measures in question were liable to have negative repercussions on the exercise of religious freedom by the adherents of the Churches concerned. The Court saw no reason to depart from the approach adopted in its judgments in Leela Förderkreis e.V. and Others v. Germany and Centre of Societies for Krishna Consciousness in Russia and Frolov v. Russia , given that the applicants’ complaints in the present case were similar.

Furthermore, an ecclesiastical or religious body could, as such, exercise on behalf of its adherents the rights guaranteed by Article 9 of the Convention, and the Court, in the cases cited above, had previously recognised the existence of interference with the rights of a religious association under Article 9. As to the individual applicants, in view of their role as pastors and representatives of their respective religious communities, they could claim to have been personally affected by the measures. Moreover, the standing of all the applicants to bring actions to complain of the measures had not been disputed in the domestic proceedings.

Hence, the measures complained of by the applicants amounted to interference with their right to freedom of religion. The Government’s preliminary objection regarding the applicants’ victim status for the purposes of Article 34 of the Convention was therefore dismissed.

(b) Whether the interference was justified – Part of the duties of the municipal authority and the local committee on combating juvenile anti-social behaviour consisted in taking the requisite action to protect minors against the potential dangers of aggressive proselytising, in particular by providing them with relevant information in that regard.

The circulation of the letter in issue had not prevented the applicant pastors or their congregations from manifesting their religion through worship or practice.

In the domestic proceedings brought by the applicants the national authorities had justified their decision to circulate the letter by citing a number of incidents that had occurred in the municipality involving what was deemed to be improper proselytism, some of which had resulted in complaints to the police. The authorities had referred to the need to raise awareness among the city’s pupils with regard to risks of that kind, stating that the aim had been to protect minors and to prevent possible breaches of public order. Such preventive powers of intervention were compatible in principle with the Contracting Parties’ positive obligations under Article 1 of the Convention to secure to everyone within their jurisdiction the rights and freedoms defined in the Convention. States were entitled to verify whether a movement or association carried on, ostensibly in pursuit of religious aims, activities which were harmful to the population or to public safety ( Metropolitan Church of Bessarabia and Others v. Moldova ).

Article 9 of the Convention did not prohibit the public authorities from making critical statements about representatives or members of religious communities. However, in order to be compatible with the Convention, such statements had to be supported by evidence of specific acts liable to pose a threat to public order or to the interests of others. They also had to avoid casting doubt on the legitimacy of the beliefs in question and must remain proportionate to the circumstances of the case.

In the present case, it did not appear from the circular letter and the information notice that the authors had been mindful of the authorities’ duty of neutrality and impartiality. On the contrary, these documents contained unqualified negative judgments. They also made unfounded references to certain proven cases of improper proselytism as reflecting the usual practice of those Churches, a fact noted by the Commission for Protection against Discrimination. Lastly, they drew comparisons with the dominant Orthodox religion and made remarks – linking, in particular, the lack of veneration of “national saints” with the division of the Bulgarian nation – which could be interpreted as casting doubt on the legitimacy of the beliefs and practices of the Churches concerned.

While the Court regarded as justifiable the intention to warn pupils against possible abusive practices by certain religious groups by informing them about such practices, it was not persuaded that the use of language of the kind referred to previously was necessary for that purpose.

The authors of the circular letter, like other public authorities, had attempted to downplay the significance of the incident and expressed their determination to respect the religious freedom of the movements targeted in the letter. However, the remarks regarded by the applicants as offensive or defamatory had not been formally withdrawn. Furthermore, neither the Commission for Protection against Discrimination nor the administrative courts had seen fit to penalise those remarks (compare Leela Förderkreis e.V. and Others v. Germany , where the Court, in finding that there had been no violation of Article 9, took account of the Constitutional Court ruling prohibiting the use of certain terms deemed to infringe the principle of State neutrality).

In sum, in view of the pejorative and hostile language used by the public authorities in the letter in question to describe the religious movement to which the applicants belonged, and the fact that the domestic proceedings brought by the applicants had not afforded appropriate redress for their complaints, the authorities of the respondent State had interfered disproportionately with the applicants’ right to freedom of religion, overstepping their margin of appreciation under Article 9 of the Convention.

Conclusion : violation (unanimously).

Article 41: EUR 2,500 each to the individual applicants and EUR 3,000 EUR each to the applicant associations in respect of non-pecuniary damage.

(See also Fédération chrétienne des témoins de Jéhovah de France v. France (dec.), 53430/99, 6 November 2001, Legal summary ; Leela Förderkreis e.V. and Others v. Germany , 58911/00, 6 November 2008, Legal summary ; Centre of Societies for Krishna Consciousness in Russia and Frolov v. Russia , 37477/11, 23 November 2021, Legal summary ; Metropolitan Church of Bessarabia and Others , 45701/99, 13 December 1999, Legal summary )

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

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