In its decision in the case of Société Bouygues Telecom v. France (application no. 2324/08), the European Court of Human Rights has unanimously declared the application inadmissible.
The decision is final.
The case concerned the proceedings which resulted in the company Bouygues Telecom being ordered to pay a fine of 58 million euros for entering into an anti-competitive agreement on the mobile telephone market.
The Court considered, in particular, that the State had acted with the requisite diligence in ensuring the applicant company’s right to be presumed innocent, that there had been no breach of the equality-of-arms principle and that the absence of a public hearing before the Competition Commission had been compensated for by the fact that the case had been reviewed by two courts (the Court of Appeal and the Court of Cassation).
