Strasbourg (France), Sep 21 (IANS/EFE) The European Court of Human Rights(ECHR) has ruled against Monaco's Princess Caroline von Hannover for her complaint against Germany on refusing to block further publication of her photo with husband on vacation.
The case goes back to 2002, when German gossip magazine 7 Tage published a photo taken of the princess and her husband, Prince Ernst August of Hannover, without their knowledge at their vacation home in Kenya.
Caroline asked the German courts to enjoin further publication of the photo.
After several conflicting rulings, Germany's Federal Court of Justice definitively rejected the princess' motion in 2009, concluding that "the freedom of expression of the magazine's publishers should not be overridden by the applicant's right to respect for her private life".
Caroline took the case to the ECHR the following year.
The princess cited the European Human Rights Convention's Article 8, which offers protections for private and family life.
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The ECHR ruled that the German courts had already "weighed in the balance the different interests at play and the precedent of the (European Human Rights) Court."
Caroline has been filing suits for more than 20 years to get German courts to protect her privacy and not allow the publications of photographs taken without her consent.
Eighteen months ago, the European Court in Strasbourg ruled against her in the suit she brought against Germany for the photos published between 2002 and 2004 in the magazines Frau im Spiegel and Frau Aktuell.
In contrast, the Strasbourg court came down in her favour in 2004 when it ruled against Germany in the case filed over photos published by several German magazines between 1993 and 1997.