N v Greek State

• Jurisdiction: Grecia
• Date: 01 January 1930
• Docket Number: Case No. 230
• Court: Court of First Instance (Greece)

Greece, Court of First Instance of Athens.

Case No. 230

N.

and

Greek State.

International Law — Treaties — Operation of — Effects on Individuals — Rights of Individuals under International Treaties — Conflict between Treaty and Subsequent Law.

The Facts.—On 30 November, 1925, Great Britain and Greece concluded two Conventions4 whereby Great Britain agreed that a sum of over £1,100,000 should be deducted from the gross war debt due from Greece to Great Britain in full and final settlement of various claims including, inter alia, claims for loss or damage caused by British or other Allied forces in Greek territory for which the British Government could be held in part or wholly responsible. The Conventions were

ratified by Greece by the Laws of 30 January and 16 March, 1926, respectively. Under a Greek Law of 1920 (No. 2109) the compensation to be paid to those who alleged that they had suffered injury was to be determined by two commissions, one deciding questions of fact connected with the alleged injury, the other deciding the amount of compensation

The plaintiff maintained that while serving in the capacity of a public official at Syra (Cyclades), he was arrested by British naval forces in November, 1916, on the ground that he was an enemy of the Allied Powers. He alleged that owing to his detention he suffered both material and moral injury. The facts were established by a decision of the Commission instituted under Law No. 2109 of 1920. The second Commission then made an award.

The plaintiff alleged that the Greek Government, basing itself on the Law in question, refused to pay him the full sum to which he was entitled by virtue of the finding of the first Commission. He maintained that the Law was contrary to the provisions of the Convention and that it was therefore unconstitutional.

Held: that the action must be dismissed. Conventions between two States regulating economic and political questions were international instruments. They were governed by the sovereign prerogatives of the States. It was true that these States acted as protectors of their subjects, but the rights and obligations arising out of conventions concerned exclusively the contracting parties. Private individuals could not directly derive any rights from these conventions, but merely from internal acts promulgated in execution of such conventions.1 From the point of view of the organs charged with executing these...