Termination of Ownership Rights by Way of Confiscation and Public Reliability of the Land Register in Latvia

https://doi.org/10.22364/iscflul.8.2.28 | Pages 410-419 | PDF

Janis Rozenfelds, Dr. iur., Professor
Faculty of Law, University of Latvia, Latvia
 

Keywords: bona fide acquirer, confiscation, criminally acquired, immovable, registration, reliability

Summary
Confiscation of property has several meanings. All of them could be reduced to “coercive deprivation by state institutions”. In modern democracies, the use of this force should be exercised carefully and in accordance with the duty of the state to protect peaceful enjoyment of possession by the subjects of the state.

This report is devoted to examination of one specific kind of confiscation, which has the following characteristic features: it is not applied as a punishment following a conviction; it could be applied to an immovable property and so interferes with the public reliability of the Land Register; and it could be applied to a person who not only is in no way linked to illegal activities, let alone a criminal offence, but who has acquired the immovable property subject to confiscation being unaware of any criminal or other fraudulent acts by other persons regarding the immovable (a bona fide acquirer). The aim of this report is to find out whether the principle of protection of everyone’s right to property as a universal human right is adequately implemented in Latvia.