Sistematične kršitve temeljnih pravic na balkanski poti

The article examines the first judicial attempt to challenge unlawful pushbacks in Slovenia, through the case of a Cameroonian asylum seeker who was unlawfully returned to Croatia and then to Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2019. Drawing on insights from her direct involvement in the legal strategy of the case, the author analyses the case law developed in this context. The article presents the factual and legal framework of the dispute, the parties’ arguments, and the reasoning of the Administrative Court and, to a lesser extent, the Supreme Court. The courts found violations of the prohibition of collective expulsion, the procedural dimension of the principle of non-refoulement, and the right to access asylum. They relied in particular on the jurisprudence of the ECtHR and the CJEU, as well as on reports by the Ombudsman and NGOs, and in line with this jurisprudence and the rules on the burden of proof, they placed the essential burden of proof on the state. Although the judgment established multiple violations and ordered the state to enable the applicant’s access to asylum, it was not implemented in practice. The article thus demonstrates both the potential and the limits of judicial protection in cases of systematic human rights violations, while also, through the concrete case, addressing the concepts of strategic litigation, crimmigration, and the externalisation of the European Union’s borders.