With so much attention going to the much debated and upcoming Chișinău Declaration, also on our blog, attention has been less on the ongoing routines of the ECHR system. In that context, the Committee of Ministers recently published its Annual Report on Supervision of the Execution of Judgments and Decisions of the European Court of Human Rights. Far from the crisis discourse around the ECHR system among politicians, the Report gives an overview, in a rather subdued tone and style, of what is happening in the ‘tail’ end of the Strasbourg procedures: to what extent states are implementing the judgments of the Court, seen from the perspective of the Committee of Ministers.
While the report highlights progress, at least three major problems continue to stand out: (1) the continuing and complete (and unsurprising of course) disengagement of Russia with the execution of earlier Court judgments to which it is still bound, even though it currently it is no longer a party to the ECHR system; (2) the continuing non-implementation of the Turkish Kavala case, one of the very few infringement procedure cases in the system; (3) the rise of the amount of pending leading cases and among those cases concerning the most serious issues (under enhanced supervision). Over 500 leading cases have been pending for more than five years. All of this goes to show that the real crisis in the ECHR system is not in one specific policy area (migration) but rather is a general issue of states not taking human rights protection at the national level and compliance with the Court’s judgments seriously enough.
This is the press release of the Committee of Ministers on the Annual Report:
Many countries made significant progress in implementing judgments and decisions from the European Court of Human Rights in 2025 but a number of important challenges remain, according to the latest annual report from the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers.
The report shows that the Committee of Ministers, which is responsible for supervising the implementation of the Court’s judgments by member states, closed a total of 949 cases during the year, compared to 894 cases in 2024 (an increase of 6.2%).
Progress across Europe
The Committee notably closed 194 leading cases, which often require new laws or practices to stop similar violations recurring, compared to 161 leading cases the previous year (up 20%). Leading cases were closed concerning 37 of the Council of Europe’s 46 member states, demonstrating progress across the continent.
“In 2025, the Committee closed nearly 1,000 cases, including nearly 200 leading cases that led to more general positive changes in the member states. This is more than a statistic: it represents justice delivered and is a powerful sign of the system’s vitality and relevance,” explained the Council of Europe’s Director General of human rights and rule of law, Gianluca Esposito.
Ukraine and Romania highlighted
The report specifically highlighted positive developments in Ukraine, which led to the closure of 97 cases – including 11 leading cases – in 2025, despite the difficult circumstances caused by Russia’s on-going war of aggression.
According to the report, Romania recorded the highest drop in total and leading cases pending full implementation during the year (-124 and -27 respectively). Austria, Estonia, France, Germany and Lithuania also recorded significant decreases in the number of leading cases pending.
Significant challenges remain
At the same time, significant challenges to the implementation of judgments remain. These include the complexity of incoming cases, continued growth in the number of leading cases pending and the fact that over 500 leading cases have been pending for more than five years.
In the light of the increasing complexity of the pending caseload, the report underlined the strategic importance of states further increasing their domestic capacity for implementing the Court’s rulings, highlighting the positive example of Romania.
The report further underlined the ongoing lack of participation and information from the Russian Federation as a major systemic obstacle. Russia was excluded from the Council of Europe in 2022, but remains legally obliged to implement relevant rulings from the Court.
The Annual Report for 2025 on the supervision of the execution of judgments and decisions of the European Court of Human Rights includes country-by-country overviews including information on new cases, pending cases and cases closed for all 46 Council of Europe member states, plus an overview of the main developments during the year.
