The European Court of Human Rights has increased its output substantially, with nearly 30% more judgments and judicial decisions issued in 2001 compared to 2000.

According to the Court's annual statistics, issued today, 889 judgments were delivered in 2001 and 8,989 judicial decisions were taken where applications were ruled inadmissible or struck out, compared to 695 judgments and 6,769 cases struck out or declared inadmissible in 2000.

There were 683 judgments giving rise to a finding of at least one violation of the European Convention on Human Rights in 2001.

More than half of these concerned Italy (359) and approaching a quarter concerned Turkey (169). There were also 32 concerning France, 19 concerning the United Kingdom, 17 concerning Poland, 14 concerning Austria and Greece and 13 concerning Germany.

Speaking at the Court's annual press conference on January 21st President Luzius Wildhaber said 2001 was "a year in which all the records were broken".

"The Court has never produced so many judgments and decisions; but nor has it ever received so many applications...I shall just give one or two figures: 13,858 applications were registered last year, making an increase of some 130% since 1998 when this Court started functioning. 31,398 provisional applications were received, an increase of about 93% since 1998. In other words, the Court's case load continues to grow; there is not the slightest indication of a falling off of demand.

The European Court of Human Rights was set up in Strasbourg in 1959 to deal with alleged violations of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights. On 1 November 1998 a full-time Court was established, replacing the original two-tier system of a part-time Commission and Court.

(A political organisation set up in 1949, the Council of Europe works to promote democracy and human rights continent-wide. It also develops common responses to social, cultural and legal challenges in its 43 member states.)

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