of certain slum areas of Ümraniye were faced with a threat to their physical integrity on account of the technical shortcomings of the municipal rubbish tip. Consequently the Court held (at p. 101): that it was impossible for the administrative and municipal departments responsible for supervising and managing the tip not to have known of the risks inherent in methanogenesis or of the necessary preventive measures … It follows that the Turkish authorities at several levels knew or ought to have known that there was a real and immediate risk to a number of persons living near the Ümraniye municipal rubbish tip. They consequently had a positive obligation under Article 2 of the Convention to take such preventive operational measures as were necessary and sufficient to protect those individuals … Given the alleged attempts by some of the carbon majors to avoid regulation of their activities, para. 102 of the Court’s judgement has particular resonance: However, it appears from the evidence before the Court that Istanbul City Council in particular not only failed to take the necessary urgent measures, either before or after 14 March 1991, but also … opposed the recommendation to that effect by the Prime Minister’s Environment Office The Court considered the type of preventative measures that might have been effective (para.107): The Court considers that the timely installation of a gas-extraction system at the Ümraniye tip before the situation became fatal could have been an effective measure … The Court also held that there had been a violation of the right to enjoyment of property (paras. 134-5): In that connection, the Court would reaffirm the principle that has already been established in substance under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 ... Genuine, effective exercise of the right protected by that provision does not depend merely on the State’s duty not to interfere, but may require positive measures of protection, particularly where there is a direct link between the measures an applicant may legitimately expect from the authorities and his effective enjoyment of his possessions. In the present case there is no doubt that the causal link established between the gross negligence attributable to the State and the loss of human lives also applies to the engulfment of the applicant’s house. In the Court’s view, the resulting infringement amounts not to “interference” but to the breach of a positive obligation, since the State officials and 25