On 17 January 2023, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) ruled in the case in the case of Daraibou v. Croatia that there had been two violations of Article 2 (right to life/investigation) of the European Convention on Human Rights

The case concerned a fire that broke out in the basement room of the Bajakovo police station, which at the time had acted as an illegal-migrant detention centre. Three migrants detained in the room had died in the fire and the applicant, also a detained migrant, had suffered severe injuries.

The Court found that the police station and its personnel had clearly been ill-prepared to deal with the outbreak of a fire, and that a number of questions have been left unanswered, despite a prompt start to the investigation. In particular, there had been shortcomings in the searching and monitoring of the detainees, who had apparently managed to keep a cigarette lighter and set fire to their bedding when left unguarded. Nor had the authorities looked into the applicant’s very serious allegations with regard to the adequacy of the premises and any fire precautions in place. Moreover, no attempt had been made to establish whether there had been broader institutional shortcomings which could have prevented a similar such tragedy happening again in the future.

On 15 February, the Court communicated the applications Epler v. Poland and Skubiszewski v. Poland concerning the interdiction to hold an assembly in the closed zone in the vicinity of Polish-Belarussian border, in which a state of emergency had been announced.

In 2021 hundreds of illegal migrants tried to cross the border and get from Belarus to Poland, apparently with the support of Belarussian authorities. In response to that crisis, on 2 September 2021 the President announced, for a period of 30 days, a state of emergency in several communes along the Polish-Belarussian border. With some exceptions listed in the Ordinance of the Council of Ministers of 2 September 2021, it was forbidden to enter the whole territory encompassed by the state of emergency. It was likewise forbidden, among other things, to organise or hold assemblies or meetings.

On 30 March, the Court found violations of the European Convention on Human Rights in the case J.A. and Others against Italy.

The case concerned Tunisian nationals, who reached the Italian coast on 16 October 2017 on board of a rudimentary vessel and were transferred to the Hotspot of Lampedusa on the same day. After 10 days of stay, the applicants were transferred to Palermo and eventually deported to Tunisia.

The ECtHR found that the Government failed to refute the applicants' allegations according to which the conditions in the hotspot were inadequate, their presence in this centre had to be considered to be a detention that was not the result of an official decision or had not been limited in time to clarify their situation or send them elsewhere, as required by law, and their situation had not been the subject of an individual assessment before the adoption of refoulement decrees, that the Court regards as a collective expulsion.