Cyprian Supreme Court to Hear Religious Discrimination Claim

October 31, 2006

(Strasbourg, France)—The Greek Cyprian Supreme Court has agreed to hear the claim of the Apostolic Church of Jesus Christ, with the hearing being tentatively scheduled for late December. At issue in the case is the definition of the term religious minister, in the context of the provision of exemptions by the Ministry of Defence from mandatory military service.

Central to the case is the Constitution of Greek Cyprus which prohibits the government or its administrative agencies and ministries from making any distinction among the various religious groups and denominations in regards the administration of legal rights. The Ministry of Defence, by statute, has also added that all ministers of religion are to be exempt from mandatory religious service.

With the clarity of the Cyprian Constitution and based on the fact that the exemption law is an absolute law, in that it exempts all ministers of religion rather than certain ministers, the issue of exemptions should be fairly clear. Despite this, when an application came to the Ministry of Defence for such an exemption from a minister of the Apostolic Church of Jesus Christ, a Protestant Christian church, the application was delayed unacceptably to the point when military duty was to be begin. Further inquiries and an application to the Human Rights Ombudsman finally garnered an answer from the Ministry which stated in essence, that because the ministers of the church did not meet certain criteria, such as being registered to perform marriages, they were not within the purview of the law. The explanation was flawed in two ways: first, none of the said requirements were laid out in the law itself which runs contrary to the forseeability requirements of the European Convention of Human Rights to which Cyprus is a signatory and second, that these requirements are not being applied to other religious groups who also lack such registration.

The European Centre for Law and Justice have been in contact with the claimant and have provided an amicus brief for the case addressing the obligations of the Court in regards the applicability of the European Convention of Human Rights, and in particular Article 9 on religious freedom and Article 14 on discrimination. We will keep you posted on the outcome of this important case.