JOINT PARTLY DISSENTING OPINION OF JUDGES VEHABOVIĆ AND KŪRIS

1. In Bukta and Others v. Hungary (no. 25691/04, § 45, 17 July 2007), Patyi and Others v. Hungary , no. 5529/05, § 53, 7 October 2008), Sáska v. Hungary (no. 58050/08, § 27, 27 November 2012), Körtvélyessy v. Hungary (no. 7871/10, § 36, 5 April 2016), Körtvélyessy v. Hungary (no. 2) (no. 58271/15, § 27, 18 July 2017) and Körtvélyessy v. Hungary (no. 3) (no. 58274/15, § 26, 3 October 2017) the Court considered that the finding of a violation of Article 11 of the Convention constituted sufficient just satisfaction for any non-pecuniary damage the applicants might have suffered. Some of these cases are rightly mentioned in paragraph 35 of the judgment.

2. While not challenging ex post facto the said considerations in these particular cases (after all, one of us was a member of the Chamber in certain of them), we think that this pattern should not be followed in the instant case. Perhaps it should even be abandoned. The State should not be able to evade its responsibility so easily, with nothing more tangible than a sheer declaration that there has been a violation, in circumstances where certain violations of the Convention appear to have become routine and repetitive. Article 41 explicitly states that, “if necessary”, just satisfaction is awarded to the injured party if the internal law of the State concerned allows only partial reparation to be made. In the instant case no reparation can be envisaged at the domestic level – not even “partial”. Does this not compel the Court to conclude that an award of just satisfaction to the applicants is “necessary”? Or, if the Court considers that such an award is not “necessary”, to provide at least some reasons for this consideration, as required by Article 45? A blunt statement that the Court “considers” amounts to saying virtually nothing, because pronouncing that the Court “considers” something is a fiat , but by no means a consideration or reasoning. The references to Patyi and Others , Sáska or Körtvélyessy (no. 3) (all cited above) do not help at all, they only disguise the absence of reasoning, because reasons are also not provided in any of these judgments – only fiats (sometimes with references to earlier fiats ).

3. The coin has two sides. There exists another approach to dealing with applicants’ claims under Article 41 in cases similar to the instant one, in that they all involve an advance ban on demonstrations. In Patyi v. Hungary (no. 35127/08, § 31, 17 January 2012) the Court held that “the applicant must have suffered some non ‑ pecuniary damage and award[ed] him, on the basis of equity, EUR 2,400”. The same goes for Szerdahelyi v. Hungary (no. 30385/07, § 39, 17 January 2012). It would not be easy to discern any difference between these two cases and the instant one which would be relevant for the purposes of Article 41.

4. We have limited ourselves to cases involving advance bans as a result of which demonstrations did not take place, and only against one and the same State, Hungary. The list, however, could be extended so as to include cases against other States. See, for example, Barankevich v. Russia (no. 10519/03, § 44, 26 July 2007) or Hyde Park and Others v. Moldova (no. 2) (no. 45094/06, § 33, 31 March 2009 ). Some consistency between the “Hungarian” case-law and its “extra-Hungarian” counterparts, let alone “internal” consonance, would perhaps do no harm.