Combating impunity of perpatrators of serious human rights violations : reflections against the background of the European Convention of Human Rights

Impunity of perpetrators who violated the most fundamental values protected by the European Convention of Human Rights remains an issue of a great concern to the Council of Europe. The importance of bringing those individuals to justice was highlighted on many occasions by stressing that it is crucial in order to ensure the full respect for human rights and, at the same time, to prevent repetition of similar infringements in future. The problem of lack of proper response to such acts by the member states has been recently a subject of deliberation of the Committee of Experts on Impunity, acting under the authority of the Steering Committee for Human Rights. In the result of its work, Guidelines on Eradicating Impunity for Serious Human Rights Violations were issued by the Committee of Ministers. The present article aims at presenting and systematizing the existing obligations of the state-parties to the European Convention of Human Rights concerning both the investigation of cases of serious human rights violations and the protection of victims' rights. To this end, specific provisions of the European Convention, as interpreted by the European Court of Human Rights in its comprehensive jurisprudence, as well as other documents of binding or non-binding character were examined.