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SCN Superior Courts Network EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS COUR EUROPEENNE DES DROITS DE L'HOMME European Court of Human Rights Operational Rules of the Superior Courts Network 13 April 2018 @UNCILOf R'ROPE 6) uv coNsElt o€ tgURoPt  2 Further to the official launch of the Superior Courts Network ("the Network") on 5 October 2015 in Strasbourg; Taking note of the Network's Cooperation Charter setting out the general principles agreed for the management and development of the Network; Taking into account the respective resources of the European Court of Human Rights ("the European Court") and the Network's member courts; Building on the lessons learned from the test phase following the launch of the Network, the Jurisconsult has drawn up the following Operational Rules: l. Focal Points L. Each of the Network's member courts shall designate a person to act as its Focal Point and shall set up a dedicated email address. Superior courts from the same State may appoint a single Focal Point to represent them. The European Court shall designate a Focal Point for each State represented in the Network. 2. The Focal Points must be proficient in at least one of the European Court's two official languages. 3. The Focal Points shall communicate via a restricted-access website (the Network's lntranet site). ll. Principal activities of the Network 4. With a view to ensuring effective exchanges within the Network, the European Court and the Network's member courts shall provide the Network with relevant information and respond to formal requests for information made by the European Court and the member courts. lll. Provision of information to the Network lnformation from the European Court 5. One of the Network's main activities is the provision by the Jurisconsult of information on the European Court's case-law, Convention law and practice and related matters via the Network's lntranet site. 6. lnformation posted by the Jurisconsult on the Network's lntranet site shall be drafted in one of the two official languages of the European Court.  3 lnformation from the superior courts 7. lnformation submitted by the superior courts does not need to be translated into one of the European Court's official languages (it should be presented under a descriptive heading indicating the subject in English or French), with the exception of responses to formal requests, and information made available by a national court for dissemination among all of the Network's member courts (see below). lV. Formal requests for information 8. Formal requests for information shall be made in one of the two official languages. To ensure their efficient management, they shall be produced using templates and shall consist of concise, numbered questions. Where necessary, they shall be accompanied by brief factual information to assist the understanding of the request. 9. Responses shall likewise be drafted in one of the two official languages Requests from the European Court 10. The European Court attaches considerable importance to contributions to its comparative-law research from the national courts belonging to the Network. 1L. Requests from the Court to this effect shall be transmitted to the Network's member courts individually. Where more than one court from the same State is a member, the courts concerned shall decide which of them is to submit the response. 12. No request may be sent to the courts of the State against which the case giving rise to the European Court's comparative study has been brought. 13. Each contribution from the national courts belonging to the Network shall be the sole responsibility of the department producing it and shall not be binding on the court concerned in the context of its judicial activities. L4. lt is not necessary to translate into one of the official languages any official domestic law instruments appended to the contribution. 15. The Jurisconsult will periodically provide the Network member courts with a compilation of their contributions to the European Court's comparative law research. Requests submitted to the European Court 16. National courts may also submit requests for information to supplement the material already posted on the Network's lntranet site.  4 17. Formal requests of this nature to the European Court must be limited to questions concerning the European Court's case-law or practice, where the Jurisconsult's contribution offers added value in relation to external sources. Since the Jurisconsult does not have the resources to satisfy all such requests, he shall decide which ones to dealwith. 18. The European Court's responses shall not be binding on the Court in the context of its judicial activities and shall be the sole responsibility of the Jurisconsult. 19. No request shall be made to the European Court concerning a case currently pending before it. V. Dissemination of information 20. lnformation shall be disseminated via the lntranet site, access to which is restricted to the Network's member courts. 21. Documents made available by the Jurisconsult shall be accessible to all of the Network's member cou rts. 22. Since exchanges between the superior courts of a particular State and the European Court are in principle not open to other national courts belonging to the Network, contributions for comparative-law surveys are initially submitted to the European Court on an exclusively bilateral basis between the national court producing them (and any other superior courts from the same State) and the European Court. Following the delivery of the relevant decision/judgment of the European Court to which the comparative contributions relate, a compilation of those contributions can be provided, in accordance with Rule 15 above, to member courts. National courts may submit any information they consider particularly relevant to their Focal Point at the European Court with a proposal to disseminate it among all members of the Network. 23. While it is not the Network's role to manage communication between national courts, the contact details of all of the Network's member courts and their Focal Points shall be accessible on the Network's lntranet site to all of the Network's member courts. 24. The superior courts' Focal Points shall be the custodians of the documents exchanged. They shall be responsible for circulating information within their respective institutions.  5 Before any documents exchanged by the Network's member courts are disseminated externally, the information must undergo additional processing in accordance with the precautionary principle. Riigikohus 0g -02- 2022 Saadud nr..........,. T : +33 (013 88 41 20 18 EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS F : +33 (0)3 88 41 27 92 couR EURopESNNS DEs DRorrs DE L'HoMME www.echr. coe. int #7243036 The President - Le Pr6sident Chief Justice Villu Kõve Supreme Court Lossi 17 50093 TARTU ESTONIA Strasbourg, 28 January 2O22 Dear Chief Justice Kõve, I acknowledge receipt of your letter of 27 January 2022 and I am delighted to hear that the Supreme Court of Estonia would like to join the Superior Courts Network (SCN). To that end, you are therefore invited to appoint your court's Focal Point for the Network, which Focal Point should then complete and return the attached Entry Form. On receipt of this form, we will ensure your court's entry into the Network and, notably, to its secured website in which the exchanges between this Court and the member superior courts take place and which houses a Knowledge Sharing platform on the Court's case-law. The management of the Network, and of its secured website, has been entrusted to the Directorate of the Jurisconsult. I enclose for your ease of reference: - The Charter of Cooperation of the Network (as amended in November 202L). ln joining the Network, your Court is considered to have accepted its provisions; and - The Operational Rules of the Network drawn up by the Jurisconsult. We should like to take this opportunity to underline the importance this Court attaches to the national courts' contribution to its comparative work (see Rules 10-15 of the Operational Rules). We look forward to hearing from you and, especially, to welcoming your court into the Superior Courts Network in the very near future. rs stnce rely, Ö Robert Spano Annexes [By post and by e-mail] cotJNclt of €r.ntrf EUROPEAN CO{JRT OF HUMAN RIGHTS coun runopEeNNE DEs DRotTs DE t'HoMME uv t?.--! COUNCII OF EUROPE f:/. CONSEII DE T'EUROPE 67075 STRASBOURG CEDEX 67075 STRASBOURG CEDEX FRANCE coN*ll Da [€t.noPG FRANCE SCN sup€rior courts Notwork IIIF EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHT9 COUREUROPEENNE DES DROITS DE L'HOMME European Court of Human Rights Cooperation Charter of the Su perior Cou rts Network  2 The member courts of the Superior Courts Network ("the Network"), Whereas the European Court of Human Rights ("the European Court") and the national courts of the member States have a shared responsibility for the implementation of the European Convention on Human Rights ("the Convention"); Aware that the achievement of this objective is assisted by the ongoing rich dialogue between the European Court and the superior courts of the member States, and that it would be further advanced by a more structured approach to such dialogue; Noting the support for the setting up by the European Court of an information exchange network as expressed at certain high-level intergovernmental conferences on the Convention system and as reflected in particular in the Brussels Declaration of March 2075; Welcoming the official launch of the Network on 5 October 2015 in Strasbourg; Have agreed the following general principles for the management and development of the Network: 1. The Network shall be set up with a view to ensuring the effective exchange of information, between the European Court and the national courts belonging to the Network, on the case-law of the European Court, Convention law and practice and the domestic law of States whose superior courts are members of the Network. Other forms of cooperation may also be envisaged. 2. The Network's restricted-access lntranet site shall offer exclusive access to the Network's member courts as well as a form of access to other international courts which have been granted observer status. lnformation exchanged via the lntranet site shall be neither secret nor confidential and must not be liable to harm the interests of any of the Network's member courts, the observers or of any of the parties to proceedings in the event of its dissemination. 3. The Network shall facilitate bilateral exchanges between the European Court and the national courts belonging to the Network; in principle such exchanges shall not be open to other national courts belonging to the Network or to the observers. The Network's lntranet site is not intended as a means of managing communication between the Network's member courts, the member courts and the observers and/or between the observers. 4. The functions, powers, judicial independence and impartiality of the different courts belonging to the Network shall be scrupulously respected. 5. Management of the Network shall be the responsibility of the European Court. To that end, the Court's Jurisconsult, acting under the authority of the Registrar and the President of the Court, shall draw up the Network's Operational Rules and, in  3 consultation with the Network's member courts, shall amend and supplement them where necessary to ensure the smooth running of the Network. SCN Superior Courts Network H EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS COUR EUROPEENNE DES DROITS DE L'HOMME Entry Form To be completed by a National Focal Point You are requested to complete and sign this form and to submit it to the European Court of Human Rights at [email protected] Name/address of the superior court for which you are the Focal Pointl: First Name: Last Name: Job Title of the Focal Point: E-mail address of the Focal Point Telephone number of the Focal Point: Preferred working language (delete as appropriate): English/French Photo of the Focal Point and copyright-free photo of the superior court 2 Signature of the Focal Point: I lf you are the Focal Point for more than one superior court, insert the names/addresses of all courts 2 lt is recommended that the photos be in GIF or JPEG (JPG) file format, with a maximum size of 10 Megapixels @ulrctl of ttJloff EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN R|GHTS coun runopErNNE DEs DRoIIS DE t'Hoi tvrE uv ,-.-tl COUNCIT OF EUROPE l:1 CONSEI! DE ['EUROPE 67075 SIR,ASBOURG CEDEX 67025 STRASSOURG CEDEX IRANCE @a\6tll DC ttUlOPl FRANCE