Zorka Đorđević lost her human right to light, when an investor built a town right next to hers in 2002, and this case had an epilogue of the European Court of Human Rights.
Đorđević has a studio apartment on the ground floor in Belgrade, where all the windows look in the same direction. When she found out that investor received a permit for the construction of a multi-story building in the immediate vicinity of her building and that such a building would impede the flow of air and access to natural light in her apartment, she wrote to the inspection. From there, they replied that they were aware of this fact and stated that the construction of a new building at that location would deny access to natural light to all apartments in the building, which would reduce the value of those apartments and the quality of life of their tenants. All this information stand in the judgment of the European Court of Human Rights.
The investor, as is often the case in Serbia, still received a building permit for the construction of a six-story building.
In response to new complaints from the tenants, the inspectorate said that "certain discrepancies between the construction project for the new building and the urban plan were found, and that they ordered the City of Belgrade to review the urban plan and project-technical documentation on the basis of which the building permit was issued, especially in the part that relates to the distance between the new construction and neighboring buildings."
The apartment became a basement.
The building nevertheless came up four years later. All the windows of the Đorđević apartment looked at the new building, and the distance between the two buildings was less than two meters.
"Experts determined that the distance between the two buildings is less than the 2,22 meters provided for in the plan and less than the prescribed minimum distance; that both windows looked into the new building, and that the natural lighting is so weak that the interior looks like twilight," according to the documents obtained by the experts of the European Court of Human Rights. "They also stated that the apartment, in terms of lighting, was effectively turned into a basement and that in such conditions it is not possible to live normally or read without artificial light. As for the drop in market value, the experts estimated it at 20 to 50 percent."
Process in Serbia
The first-instance court accepted the applicant's claim and awarded her 825.440 dinars in damages with statutory interest, but the appellate court overturned the verdict and sent the case back for a new decision. The first-instance court then rejected the applicant's claim, although it found that the market value of the apartment decreased by 20 percent due to the proximity of the new building that blocked natural light and ventilation, because it considered that the defendants could not be held responsible because the investor sold the apartments and was no longer the owner of the building.
A long and painful process of dragging several more courts followed. In the end, the Supreme Court of Cassation concluded that the new building was built on the basis of a valid building permit and that the decline in the market value of the applicant's apartment was not significant.
After that judgment, the investor initiated enforcement proceedings against the applicant in order to return the amount he had previously paid to her.
How much does justice cost?
The European Court also made its own decision - they believe that Đorđević suffered damage that was not insignificant, regardless of the fact that the new building was built in accordance with the issued permits. The court further reminded that the construction inspection and experts found irregularities in the permits issued to the investor.
Serbia is obliged to pay the applicant the amount of 7.000 euros in the name of compensation for material damage with statutory default interest from March 12, 2009, the amount of 6.000 euros in the name of compensation for non-material damage due to the violation of rights, and the amount of 5.685 euros in the name of the costs of the procedure.
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