European Court of Human Rights orders Serbia to pay damages to Syrian refugee

The Syrian, identified in court documents by the initials SE, lived in Belgrade from 2014 until 2022 and was granted refugee status in 2015. His law suit said that he was unable to travel out of Serbia because his Syrian passport had expired and the Serbian authorities rejected his request for a travel document for refugees. <a href="https://hudoc.echr.coe.int/#{%22itemid%22:</p>

%22001-225763%22]}">The court said that the Internal Affairs Ministers failed to implement regulations on travel documents for refugees since 2008, despite being required to do so by the Asylum Act.

The court awarded damages of 3,500 Euro.

The court also ruled that Serbia is required to take both individual and general measures to address the structural problem. It said that there is a “need for statutory and operational measures to complete legislative framework and implementing regulations providing effective right to leave the country”.