The Liechtensteins were unsuccessful at the regional court, they wanted to recover property in the Břeclav region

Brno - The property in the Břeclav region, including the castles in Lednice and Valtice, does not have to be returned to the House of Liechtenstein by the state and other institutions. The Regional Court in Brno today affirmed the decision of the court in Břeclav, which rejected the lawsuit of the Prince of Liechtenstein Foundation demanding the return of the property from the state, which it claims is using unlawfully. The Liechtensteins lost this property in 1945 based on the Beneš decrees. The legal representative of the foundation, Aleš Linhart, told reporters after the hearing that he would appeal to the Supreme Court.

The foundation filed lawsuits at 26 Czech district courts at the end of 2018, one of which was the court in Břeclav. In the lawsuits, the foundation points out that the last holder of the ancestral properties in Czech territory, Franz Joseph II, was not a citizen of Germany, but of neutral Liechtenstein, moreover, the head of a sovereign state. The confiscation of the property was thus illegal, according to the foundation. However, Prince Franz Joseph II of Liechtenstein registered with the German nationality authorities in the 1930s, and therefore his property was forfeited to the state after World War II based on the Beneš decrees.

"The court's decision did not surprise us; courts essentially keep deciding similarly and do not want to hear our arguments. We plan to appeal just like in other cases," Aleš Linhart stated. The foundation currently has eight constitutional complaints filed and plans to file more if the Supreme Court continues to rule against it.

"It has been clear for some time that it essentially does not matter how many Czech courts now decide in favor of the Czech state. The dispute will be decided at the international level, as there has been and continues to be serious violations of fundamental rights in proceedings on the territory of the Czech Republic," stated Michal Růžička, the foundation's spokesperson, in a statement to the media, who did not wish to comment on today's ruling.

The statement references that Liechtenstein is seeking the property in the Czech Republic at the European Court of Human Rights, and the dispute is being pursued at the state level.

Among the 14 state institutions that faced the lawsuit at the Břeclav court were, for example, Lesy ČR (Czech Forests), the National Heritage Institute, the Moravian River Basin Authority, and the Czech Agency for Nature Conservation and Landscape Protection.

District courts are deciding on the foundation's lawsuits at different paces. According to available information, the Liechtensteins have not yet succeeded with any of these lawsuits. This is also true for the Constitutional Court, which for example rejected the Liechtensteins' complaint in May of this year concerning real estate in the Kolínsko area, which is currently held by forest and water management enterprises and other state entities.