An application to the European Court of Human Rights is not an appeal that re-examines whether a Greek court reached the right result on the merits. The Court does not sit as a fourth instance, second-guessing how domestic judges weighed the evidence or applied Greek law. Its only question is narrower and more precise: did the Greek State, in the course of these proceedings, violate a specific right guaranteed by the European Convention on Human Rights? That distinction shapes everything about whether a case is viable, and the admissibility bar that sits in front of it is unforgiving — every domestic remedy capable of putting right the alleged violation must genuinely have been exhausted, and the application itself must be filed within four months of the final domestic decision. There is no extension and very little tolerance for a late filing. An ECtHR and human rights lawyer in Greece assesses admissibility first, because most applications fail there rather than on the merits.
Certain categories of claim against Greece succeed at Strasbourg more often than others, because they map cleanly onto specific Convention guarantees. Article 6 fair trial violations — a hearing that was not genuinely independent, inadequate time or means to prepare a defence, a failure to give reasons — are among the most frequently litigated. Property rights claims under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1, including disputes over title, expropriation and coastal zone determinations, are another recurring category in the Greek context. Length-of-proceedings claims, where a domestic case has dragged on for years beyond what is reasonable, are a third. Each of these requires identifying not just that the outcome felt unjust, but precisely which Convention guarantee the domestic process failed to honour, and — where the Court finds a violation — engages the State's liability to remedy it.
The case that succeeds at Strasbourg is never "the Greek court got it wrong." It is a precisely identified failure — of process, of timing, of a specific guarantee — measured against the Convention, not against how the losing side feels about the result. Exhaustion of domestic remedies is judged strictly, so an ECtHR and human rights lawyer in Greece reviews the whole domestic history.
This is where a former judge's perspective becomes genuinely useful rather than a marketing line. Stefanos Pantazis, the firm's founding partner, is a former member of the Hellenic judiciary who spent his judicial career handling a broad range of civil and commercial cases at first instance. That experience gives him direct, practical insight into how Greek courts actually reason, what a Greek judge's file looks like from the inside, and where the systemic gaps between domestic practice and Convention standards tend to arise — insight that is very difficult to replicate without having sat on the other side of the bench. Since founding the firm in 2002, Stefanos has practised civil and commercial litigation before every level of the Greek court system, from first instance through the Areios Pagos, which is precisely the route a case must travel — genuinely and correctly — before an application to Strasbourg can even be considered. Send the final domestic decision and its service date.
Not an appeal
The ECtHR is not a fourth-instance appeal
The Court asks only whether Greece violated a specific Convention right — not whether the domestic court reached the correct result on the merits.
Strict deadline
The 4-month deadline is strict and unforgiving
The clock runs from the final domestic decision. There is no general extension, and a late application is not admissible.
Exhaustion first
Domestic remedies must be genuinely exhausted first
Every available and effective domestic remedy must have been used correctly before Strasbourg will consider the case at all.
Precision matters
Identifying the precise Convention violation is everything
A viable application names the exact Article and the exact procedural failure — not a general sense that the case went badly.