12 judges of the European Court of Human Rights that have collaborated to varying degrees with Open Society Foundation
Regarding the Open Society Foundation (OSF), 12 judges have collaborated to varying
degrees with this organization:
• Judge Garlicki has been a member of an “individual-against-State” program at the
Central European University since 1997, and has participated in several educational
programs in cooperation with the Open Society Institute in Budapest and the Central
European University in Budapest, university founded and funded by the OSF.
• Judge Grozev was a member of the Board of the Open Society Institute of Bulgaria
from 2001 to 2004 as well as of the Board of the Open Society Justice Initiative (OSJI,
New York), from 2011 to 2015.
• Judge Kūris was a member of the Board of the Open Society Foundation of Lithuania
from 1993 to 1995, a member of the coordinating board from 1994 to 1998, an expert
on the publishing program from 1999 to 2003 and a member of another council from
1999 to 2003. He was therefore active there from 1993 to 2003.
• Judge Laffranque was, between 2000 and 2004, a member of the Executive Council of
the Center for Political Studies - PRAXIS, an organization founded in 2000 and
funded since by the Open Society Institute.
• Judge Mijović was a member of the Executive Council of the Open Society
Foundation of Bosnia and Herzegovina from 2001 to 2004, as well as a member of the
Bosnian OSF project team in 2001.
• Judge Mits has been teaching since 1999 at the Riga Law School, of which he
became a vice-rector, as well as at the Judicial Training Center in Latvia, both founded
and co-funded by the Open Society of Latvia.
• Judge Pavli, a former student of the Central European University, was a lawyer with
the Open Society Justice Initiative from 2003 to 2015 and then director of programs of
the OSF for Albania from 2016 to 2017.
• Judge Sajó was a member of the Board of the Open Society Justice Initiative (OSJI,
New York) from 2001 to 2007, and a professor at the Central European University in
Budapest from 1992 to 2008.
• Judge Šikuta was a member of expert committees of the Open Society Foundation of
Slovakia from 2000 to 2003. He was not remunerated for this function.
• Judge Turković was a member of the Board of the Open Society Institute of Croatia
from 2005 to 2006 and a member of the research team of this same organization from
1994 to 1998.
• Judge Vučinić wrote various articles for the Open Society Institute and contributed to
its reports in 2005 and 2008; he is also a member of the board of two NGOs funded by
the OSF.
• Judge Ineta Ziemele has been teaching since 2001 at the Riga Law School, founded
and co-funded by the Open Society of Latvia.
Other judges finally collaborated in a less formal manner; therefore, they will not be
integrated in the rest of the study.
This phenomenon is not limited to members of the Court. For example, Nils Muižnieks,
Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe from 2012 to 2018, was also
director of programs of the Open Society of Latvia until 2012. In 2009, he explained that the
Open Society wishes to create a new man - homo sorosensus [in reference to Soros] - man of
open society, as opposed to homo sovieticus. Within the scope of his official activities, he
condemned several initiatives by the Hungarian government, notably the so-called “anti-
Soros” bill.
Source: NGOs and the Judges of the ECHR 2009 – 2019
https://eclj.org/ngos-and-the-judges-of-the-echr