The Liechtenstein authorities filed a complaint with the European court of human rights (ECHR), in which they claimed a part of the territory of the Czech Republic that is ten times larger than the current area of the country. This is reported by the Financial Times.
The Principality is going to take the land that was confiscated by Czechoslovakia after the Second world war on the basis of the Benes decrees. In them, the princes of Liechtenstein were called collaborators of the Nazi regime.
Foreign Minister of Liechtenstein Catherine Eggenberger stressed that the annexation of land is still an unresolved issue for the Principality, as it affects issues of sovereignty. According to her, the smaller the country, the more important it is for it to defend its rights, and confiscation without compensation is unacceptable.
In turn, the Czech Deputy foreign Minister Martin Smolek said that the ECHR cannot accept the complaint, since the events occurred before the adoption of the European Convention on human rights. He recalled that the ECHR had not previously dealt with such issues.
The territorial dispute between the Czech Republic and Liechtenstein has been going on for more than 70 years. It concerns an area of more than two thousand square kilometers, where the Baroque residence of Waltice and the neo-Gothic castle of Lednice are located. The objects are recognized as part of the UNESCO cultural heritage. The countries established diplomatic relations only in 2009.
The partition of Czechoslovakia has already taken place in history. The Munich agreement of 1938, which ceded parts of the country to Germany, Hungary and Poland, is considered one of the harbingers of the beginning of world war II. The Treaty was signed by Germany, great Britain, France and Italy, and initiated by Berlin, which got the Sudetenland. Czechoslovakia’s sovereignty over the region was consolidated after world war I as a result of the Treaty of Saint-Germain.