On 30 March 2010 the Third Section of the European Court of Human Rights (‘ECtHR’), sitting as a Chamber, issued its judgement in the case Handölsdalen Sami Village and Others v. Sweden.[1] The case concerns the rights of the Sami[2] to use privately owned land for winter grazing of their reindeers in the municipality of Härjedalen. The case originates in proceedings before Swedish courts that were initiated by a large number of private landowners against the Sami villages, and which were concluded in substance with a Court of Appeal judgment prohibiting the villages from using land without previously concluding a…