Source: https://www.juridicainternational.eu/index.php?id=15632
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 10:45:49+00:00

Document:
The number of legal journals published in Estonia has always been limited. On the one hand, the reasons for such scarcity have always rested with the small population, which limits the size of the Estonian legal audience and thus the potential number of readers. On the other hand, the twists and turns of (recent) history have always meant interruptions in the publication of legal journals. Publishing two, three or even four journals at the same time has proven possible only in a very limited number of years. There is usually no reason to talk about decades in this context. All the more reason for us, as the publishers and authors of this journal, to be proud of the publication of yet another issue of our magazine. The first issue of Juridica International – the foreign language companion to the Estonian language journal Juridica, which has been published since 1993 – appeared twenty years ago, in 1996. Professor Paul Varul, Editor-in-Chief of Juridica International from 1996–2015, took a look back at these first twenty years in the editor’s column of our last issue. Juridica International has acted like a seismograph when it comes to reflecting reforms in Estonian law and legal education. When Estonia joined the European Union in 2004, new and significantly more international challenges alreadly came along during the preparatory stage, not to mention the subsequent active participation in the harmonisation processes of European Union law. The foreign language journal, published at and with the means of the Faculty of Law of Estonia’s own national university, the University of Tartu, has given our legal practitioners a chance to express their views among an international community of scholars in a highly visible manner. Juridica International has also played an important part in publishing materials from legal conferences and seminars held in Estonia. Juridica International has become an attractive international journal that reaches well beyond the borders of Estonia and the European Union. This widespread circulation has been assisted by free access online – a decision made by Juridica International years before “open access” became a keyword of global research policy.
In the span of only a couple of decades, the journal that first started as the “calling card” of the Faculty of Law at the University of Tartu, mainly introducing and analysing Estonia’s own legal developments, has become an internationally open, peer-reviewed legal journal that is represented in the most acknowledged databases. Since Juridica International is a universal legal journal by its very essence, and this number is not a topically focused conference issue, the geography of both the authors and the topics covered reflect points of interest and concern in the legal science of our region. A special place is reserved for the principal foundations of the European Union and European legal culture in general, and the latest developments in the law of Europe, Estonia, and other countries are addressed as always. One of the obvious causes for concern is Russia’s legal concept, and the legal situation of both it and its neighbours deserves an observant analysis.
As the new Editor-in-Chief of the journal, I thank all the editors, colleagues at the editorial board, and the technical team for their continued energy and hard work. For our readers, as well as current and future authors, I hope this issue will be thought-provoking, give you topics to reflect on, and a reason to join us time and again.
The paper was written to analyse the enforceability of the judgements of the European Court of Human Rights in Russia, particularly in light of recent amendments to the Law on the Constitutional Court and relevant case law of the Constitutional Court of Russia. Article 46 of the European Convention on Human Rights, obliging member states to execute the judgements of the European Court of Human Rights, does not leave room for ‘cherry-picking’ in enforcing the judgements. However, the Constitutional Court has suggested that Russian authorities should indeed engage in cherry-picking and may refuse to enforce judgements that are not in accordance with the Russian Constitution as interpreted by the Constitutional Court. In December 2015, the Russian parliament amended the Law on the Constitutional Court so as to empower said court to declare judgements of the European Court of Human Rights unenforceable when implementation would be in conflict with the Constitution of Russia. The paper discusses the background of these developments and alternatives for overcoming the conflict between domestic legislation and the instruments of the Council of Europe.
Cloud-based services (especially IaaS) are widely used by businesses, including small and medium-sized enterprises. The recently adopted General Data Protection Regulation is going to influence the EU cloud computing market significantly, and SMEs using IaaS to process personal data of their clients face a need to adapt to those changes if they are to remain compliant with the data protection rules. The objective with the paper was to look into the regulation adopted and identify the aspects that significantly influence the relations between a cloud provider and a client, especially if seen from the perspective of SMEs. Further, the paper discusses whether IaaS will be an obvious choice for SMEs seeking to hire computer infrastructure resources for the purpose of processing personal data when the compliance efforts necessary after the General Data Protection Regulation comes into force are taken into account. The findings suggest that forthcoming changes could significantly affect the industry and, in light of the likely increase in transaction costs, that SMEs may want to consider traditional outsourcing services instead. Consequently, the results of the data protection reform would be contradictory to other objectives of the European Commission, especially that of wider adoption of cloud services by SMEs.
Section 23 of Estonia’s General Part of the Environmental Code Act sets out a subjective right to environment. The purpose behind the paper is to examine the basis for the right and analyse its scope and contents in order to determine whether it satisfies the criteria outlined by the Supreme Court for an independent material enforceable subjective right to environment.
The right has no explicit basis in international, EU, or constitutional law. The GPECA’s §23 was intended to codify and expand the existing court practice surrounding the basic environmental right. However, the provision does not satisfy the criteria set forth by the Supreme Court, on account of ambiguities in the formulation of the right. The elements of the provision are analysed, and several suggestions are made for the purpose of clarifying the ambiguities.
The term ‘beneficial owner’ has been applied by Ukrainian courts and tax authorities in the area of application of the provisions of double-taxation treaties since the adoption of the Tax Code of Ukraine, in 2010. The changing nature of the concept of beneficial owner, its importance as an instrument for counteraction of treaty shopping, and the necessity of improvement of its application in the Ukrainian reality are the main factors that have a strong impact on the development of national practice in the application of the concept of beneficial owner. The article focuses on the main challenges to application of the concept of beneficial owner in the context of prevention of tax avoidance as one of the purposes of double-taxation treaties in Ukraine.
The Estonian Foundation – What is Missing for It to Be A Well-Designed Wealth-Management Vehicle for Local and Foreign High-Net-Worth Individuals?
Although Estonia has a foundations regulation that enables establishing private foundations, the local high-net-worth individuals prefer to use schemes and foundations offered by other countries and Estonia’s export of the relevant service is a non-issue today. The article explores why this is so. One of the biggest problems certainly is the current double taxation of private foundations. Another major problem is excessive accountability and publicity: an Estonian foundation is registered in a public register from which the information on that foundation is accessible to everyone. This includes the data on the founder and beneficiaries; the content of the bylaws; and, through annual reports, information on the foundation’s income, wealth, and assets. The authors propose amendments to the current regulation and, to justify the changes, suggest some incentives for encouraging the establishment of private foundations in Estonia.
Da nach der Rechtsprechung des EGMR Art. 6 der Konvention das Begründen der Gerichtsurteile fordert, ist es klar, dass auch in der estnischen Rechtsordnung das Recht der Person auf ein begründetes Gerichtsurteil als Bestandteil des fairen Verfahrens anerkannt werden muss. Nach der Rechtsprechung des Staatsgerichtshofs ergibt das Recht auf faires Verfahren aus § 15 Abs. 1 GG in Verbindung mit § 14 GG. Im § 15 Abs. 1 Satz 1 GG ist festgelegt, dass Jedermann das Recht hat, sich im Falle der Verletzung seiner Rechte an ein Gericht zu wenden. § 14 GG fügt hinzu, dass die Gewährleistung der Rechte und Freiheiten eine Pflicht der gesetzgebenden, vollziehenden und rechtsprechenden Gewalt wie auch der örtlichen Selbstverwaltungen ist. Nach der Rechtsprechung des Staatsgerichtshofs muss § 15 Abs. 1 Satz 1 GG den ”lückenlosen gerichtlichen Schutz der Rechte” gewährleisten. Das heibt, dass es möglich sein muss, jedes subjektive Recht vor Gericht in einem effizienten und fairen Verfahren innerhalb einer angemessenen Zeit zu realisieren.
Domestic violence has been under public scrutiny for some time both internationally and in Estonia. A highly negative social phenomenon, it causes considerable harm to individuals` basic rights and thereby poses an acute legal problem. Accordingly, the objective with the article is to address the attitudes of Estonia’s practising legal experts towards domestic violence from the perspective of recognising it and to support the idea of exploring options for further systematising the relevant legislation. World judicial practice uses two fundamental types of regulation to address domestic violence: reconciling and punitive. According to a survey carried out among Estonia’s practising lawyers in 2014, legal professionals may favour either kind of regulation. The authors of the article hold the view that Estonia needs fairly separate regulation for preventing and combating domestic violence yet regulation that is integrated well into the system at large. Obviously, laws cannot solve all problems related to domestic violence on their own; however, the potential of laws should not be underestimated.
The New Public Procurement Law: Simpler and More Flexible?

References: §23
 Art. 6
 § 15
 § 14
 § 15
 § 14
 § 15