Stankov and the United Macedonian Organisation Ilinden v. Bulgaria, Nos. 29221/95, 29225/95, ECtHR (First Section), 2 October 2001

Refusal to register an association harbouring separatist views. Interference with the right to peaceful assembly. Denial of an ethnic minority’s collective rights.

Art. 11 ECHR

The fact that a group of persons calls for autonomy or even requests secession of part of a country’s territory, thus demanding fundamental constitutional and territorial changes, cannot automatically justify a prohibition of its assemblies.

(In the present case, the Bulgarian Supreme Court refused to register an association whose meetings were perceived as liable to disguise separatist aims to the benefit of the Macedonian minority in Bulgaria).

According to the ECtHR, the restrictions on the applicant association’s public meetings infringed its members’ right to peaceful assembly under article 11 of the Convention.
Similarly to the present judgment, see also the Court’s following decision United Macedonian Organisation Ilinden-PIRIN and Others v. Bulgaria of 2006.