… 6(1) of the ECHR provides that in the determination of his civil rights and obligations or of any criminal charge against him, everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an
independent
and
impartial
tribunal established by law. …
… That right relates to the principle of effective judicial protection which has, moreover, been enshrined in
Article
47
of the
Charter
of Fundamental Rights (see, to that effect, judgment of 16 July 2009, Der Grüne Punkt - Duales System Deutschland v Commission, C-385/07 P, EU:C:2009:456, paragraphs 177 and 179).
98 In addition, the European Court of Human Rights noted, first, that the purpose of the reasonable time principle was, inter alia, to protect a person charged with a criminal offence against …
… guaranteed, even if, as the applicant had claimed on several occasions in his letters sent to the Council, those proceedings, which had already been ongoing for several years, and had been, in some instances, suspended or transferred several times between investigation bureaux, were still at the pre-trial investigation stage and had been brought before a Ukrainian court for the consideration not of the substance but, at most, of mere procedural questions.
97 In that regard, it should be noted that
Article
…