Latvia Ratifies Human Rights Convention Protocol

The protocol will enter into force in Latvia on March 1 next year. On November 6, the Law on Protocol 16 of the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms entered into force, with which the Saeima supported Latvia’s accession to the protocol.

With the entry into force of the protocol in Latvia, the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Court will have the right to request the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) to provide an advisory opinion on important issues of interpretation or application of the rights and freedoms guaranteed by the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms or its protocols.

The conclusions reached in the advisory opinion of the ECtHR are not legally binding, however, they provide insight and guidelines for the interpretation and application of the rights guaranteed in the convention and its protocols in disputed and previously unresolved issues.

The Protocol was opened for signature on October 2, 2013, and entered into force on August 1, 2018, when ten member states of the Convention had acceded to it. Currently, the protocol has been ratified by 26 member states of the convention: Albania, Andorra, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, France, Greece, Georgia, Estonia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Montenegro, Moldova, Monaco, Netherlands, Romania, San Marino, Slovakia, Slovenia, Finland, Spain, Ukraine, North Macedonia, Sweden and Latvia. The protocol has been signed by three more member states of the convention: Italy, Norway and Turkey.