Sipos Szabo v NATO and the Kingdom of Belgium

On By In Labour Court of Appeal
Brussels Labour Court of Appeal, Sipos Szabo v North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Kingdom of Belgium, 2018/AB/22, Nr. 28 October 2020
ECLI:BE:CTBRL:2019:ARR.20190207.11

The case concerned a medical doctor who claimed an entitlement under NATO’s Civilian Personnel Regulation (CPR) to an indefinite contract and had brought its claims before NATO’s Administrative Tribunal. NATO’s Tribunal ruled it had no jurisdiction to entertain the claims because the plaintiff concluded successive sui generis contracts that NATO was entitled to offer. Those contracts did not bring the plaintiff within the realm of the CPR, while the jurisdiction of NATO’s Tribunal is limited to alleged breaches of the CPR. The plaintiff brought her claims before Belgian courts, host nation of NATO, and argued on the basis of ECtHR case-law relating to the interplay between the right to a judge and International Organizations’ immunity that NATO’s immunity must be set aside because she did not have access to an effective remedy within NATO’s legal system as NATO’s Tribunal declared itself without jurisdiction and arguably did not consider the merits of her claims. NATO’s immunity was upheld before Brussels’ Labour Tribunal and, on appeal, by the Brussels Labour Court of Appeal which agreed with NATO that the plaintiff’s argument was based on a wrong premise, that NATO’s internal justice system was effective and independent, that the plaintiff was heard and received an articulated legal answer to her claims following due process.

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Baghouri et al. v Belgium

On By In Court of Appeal
Brussels Court of Appeal, Baghouri et al. v Kingdom of Belgium, Nr. 2020/******/C, 21 October 2020

The case concerns an appeal against two Orders of the Tribunal of First Instance of 11 December 2019 and 25 February 2020, ordering the Belgian State to provide consular assistance to several children held at the Al-Hol refugee/detention camp in Syria, as well as to provide necessary identity and travel documents enabling them to travel to Belgium.

The appellants seek reform of the contested Order inasmuch as it states that they are not eligible for consular assistance since they cannot invoke Article 9 of the Convention of the Rights of the Child (CRC) in order not to be separated from their children against their will. They claim that the Order is not in the best interests of the children and violates the CRC, the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU and Article 22bis of the Constitution. However, the Court of Appeal finds this claim to be unfounded as the parents are not eligible for consular assistance pursuant to Article 83 Consular Code. This is so because they travelled to a region undergoing armed conflict despite a negative travel advice from the Belgian authorities.

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A. et al v Kingdom of Belgium

On By In First Instance Tribunal
Brussels First Instance Tribunal, A. et al v Kingdom of Belgium, Nr. 2020-14-C, 29 April 2020

This case concerns a man who travelled to Syria in 2013 and who was detained in the prison of Al-Hasakah by the Syrian-Kurdish authorities. Relying on several human rights and humanitarian treaties, the man claimed that the Belgian government was under an obligation to repatriate him from Syria. The Tribunal nonetheless held that the applicant was not within the ‘jurisdiction’ of the Belgian State, and that he could also not rely on the Geneva Conventions or the ICC Rome Statute since Belgium was not a party to the armed conflict in Syria. The Tribunal further held that, having travelled to Syria on his own initiative, the applicant was not entitled to consular assistance pursuant to Article 83 of the Belgian Consular Code.

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Kingdom of Belgium v E.M.

On By In Court of Appeal
Brussels Court of Appeal, Kingdom of Belgium v E. M., Nr. 2020 KR 3, 5 March 2020

This case concerns a Belgian woman who had travelled to Syria to join her partner and claimed to have given birth to a son there. Held in the camp of Al-Hol, operated by the Kurdish authorities, she sued the Belgian State to repatriate her son and herself from Syria. The Court of Appeal of Brussels ruled that the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs providing for the repatriation of all Belgian children up to ten years old from Syrian territory created a subjective right prone to judicial review. Further, having regard to Article 22bis(4) of the Belgian Constitution as well as Article 3(1) of the Convention of the Rights of the Child, the government’s discretionary power to exercise the right to consular assistance was limited by the child’s best interests.  Having regard to the fact that the Kurdish authorities controlled the Al-Hol camp and could determine the modalities for repatriation, the Court found that Belgium did not exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction in the sense of the ECHR or the ICCPR. Nor did the human right to enter one’s own country entail a positive obligation on the part of the State to ensure repatriation.

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L. DE BRUCKER, “Het recht op consulaire bijstand vanuit nationaal-, Europees- en internationaalrechtelijk perspectief. Naar een subjectief recht op repatriëring voor kinderen van Syriëstrijders?”, Tijdschrift voor Jeugd- en Kinderrechten 2020, 194-210.

Baghouri et al. v Belgium

On By In First Instance Tribunal
Brussels First Instance Tribunal, Baghouri et al. v Kingdom of Belgium, Nr. 2020/******/C, 25 February 2020

The case concerns an appeal by the Belgian government against an Order of the Tribunal of First Instance of 11 December 2019, ordering the Belgian State to provide consular assistance to several children held at the Al-Hol refugee/detention camp in Syria, as well as to provide necessary identity and travel documents enabling them to travel to Belgium.

The Court recognizes the temporary impossibility for the Belgian State to fully execute the Order within the allotted time. This finding is based on the fact that the Belgian State repeatedly requested the Kurdish authorities for the Belgian State to be allowed to provide consular assistance to the children and to organize their repatriation without their parents. The Kurdish authorities refused this request several times because they could not allow the separation of the children from their parents under Kurdish law. In addition, the security threat was such as to jeopardize the security of the consular mission and the children during their repatriation. For this reason, the Court grants the Belgian State an extension of time to implement the decision.

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