Principle of the Right to a Fair Trial: Criteria and the Practice of the European Court of Human Rights for Ukraine

Due to the rapid development of social relations and the desire of the state to regulate social relations in the legal field, there are some gaps in the application of different rules of law. The article «The principle of the right to a fair trial: the elements of the hearing and the case law of the European Court of Human Rights in Ukraine» discusses the principle of the right to the fair trial, which covers a rather broad list of standards, namely: the right to a public hearing, a fair hearing the term, equality of parties and the right to a reasoned court decision, the right to access to justice, the competitive nature of the court proceedings, the validity of the court proceedings, the rule of  the law. The European Court of Human Rights has repeatedly argued for a particularly important place in the democratic society for the right to the fair trial. Statistics are analyzed and reported that numerous complaints to the European Court of Human Rights are related to a violation of Article six of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. This is also due to the fact that complaints of violations of other articles of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms often arise because justice did not meet the requirements of justice. In the case-law of the European Court of Human Rights, cases against Ukraine have been considered, alleging breach of the principle of fairness.

It is concluded that the right to the fair trial is one of the key ones, since without proper protection of this right all other rights of the person remain unprotected. Analyzing the case law of the European Court of Human Rights on Ukraine, we can conclude that the causes of human rights violations most often lie in the imperfect legislation of our country or in its practical application by state bodies and judicial authorities. In order to improve the decision-making process by national courts, it is necessary to reform the legislation and to implement it in practice, which will in the future avoid violations of Article six of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.