Original scientific paper
https://doi.org/10.3935/zpfz.75.2.6
Positive Obligations of the Republic of Croatia in Cases of Domestic Violence: Lessons From the Recent Case-Law of the European Court of Human Rights
Lucija Sokanović
orcid.org/0000-0003-4274-7789
; Faculty of Law, University of Split, Split, Croatia
Antonija Krstulović Dragičević
orcid.org/0009-0005-9212-4880
; Faculty of Law, University of Split, Split, Croatia
Abstract
Effective protection of the rights guaranteed by the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms requires states to undertake positive actions or activities in addition to the negative obligations that require the state to refrain from interfering with, or encroaching on, human rights. Unlike the negative obligations that have always been inherent in the European Convention, the concept of positive obligations has been applied since the late 1960s under the influence of the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights in the Belgian linguistic case. The paper deals with the shortcomings in national legislation and case-law identified by the European Court of Human Rights in the cases: Vučković v. Croatia, Malagić v. Croatia and J. I. v. Croatia. Given that all judgments address domestic violence, an evaluation of positive obligations was carried out, which showed that no weakness was identified in establishing an appropriate legal framework, but there are deficiencies in the reasoning of decisions on punishment, as well as in conducting an effective investigation of violence.
Keywords
positive obligations; European Court of Human Rights; violence; domestic violence; effective investigation
Hrčak ID:
336839
URI
Publication date:
20.10.2025.
Visits: 220 *