Leo van Doesburg

On Friday 4 th of March, the Justice and Home Affairs Council will meet to discuss and vote on the European Commission’s proposal to include hate speech and hate crime onto the list of EU crimes of Article 83 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU). 

STRASBOURG, France — The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights has agreed to hear an appeal in a lawsuit filed against the Swiss government after authorities there would not provide a woman who does not suffer from any fatal disease with drugs to commit suicide. An ECHR panel ruled 4-3 in May of this year that Switzerland’s law banning lethal poison in such circumstances violates Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (right to respect for private and family life) because the court considered the law vague. “The government has an obligation to protect life, not facilitate death,” said Legal Counsel Paul Coleman. “Claims to personal autonomy do not override national laws designed to protect the weak and vulnerable. We trust the Grand Chamber will support this principle, which is entirely consistent with the European Convention on Human Rights.” (Press release of the Alliance Defending Freedom)

A panel of five judges at the European Court of Human Rights will tomorrow (Monday 27th May) consider whether the cases of Shirley Chaplin and Gary McFarlane should be heard by the Grand Chamber of the Court. These cases are very significant for the future of Christian freedoms in the UK and across the Council of Europe area (c. 800 million citizens). In a press release, Christian Concern (defending these cases) asks people to pray that the Judges refer the cases to the Grand Chamber. 

Four British Christians who claim they lost their jobs as a result of discrimination against their beliefs are taking their cases to the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). They include an airline worker stopped from wearing a cross and a counsellor who refused to deal with gay couples.  All four lost separate employment tribunals relating to their beliefs.Secular critics have said any ruling in favour of the group could "seriously undermine" UK equality law. A ruling is not expected from the ECtHR for several weeks.  The ECPM is concerned about these cases which involve British Airways check-in clerk Nadia Eweida, nurse Shirley Chaplin, relationship counsellor Gary McFarlane and registrar Lilian Ladele. (Please find the article from the BBC Please read here the whole article and more information about the cases , find the article from the BBC here )

Strasbourg , 15 March 2012. In today’s Chamber judgment in the case of GAS et DUBOIS c. France (Requête n o 25951/07) , the European Court of Human Rights held, by six votes to one, that there had been no violation of the European Convention on Human Rights by the limitation of MPA techniques to heterosexual couples and by the French refusal to allow a woman to adopt her same-sex partner’s child. (Source: Grégor Puppinck , Director of the European Center for Law and Justice (ECLJ) See further information here