32 NEUMEISTER v. AUSTRIA JUDGMENT considers more particularly relevant in relation to the first or second provision. 29. On the question of the procedure in Austria for the consideration of applications for release pending trial, the Government mainly refers to the Commission’s opinion that this procedure does not infringe Article 6 (1) (art. 6-1) or Article 5 (4) (art. 5-4). It remarks that it has always agreed with the restrictive interpretation of the words "civil rights" ("droits de caractère civil") apparent in all the Commission’s decisions. It thinks however, unlike the Commission, that the Convention leaves it to the municipal law of each Contracting State to define these terms and that the States have no common view on the matter. It asks the Court for a ruling on this important question. 30. At the hearing of 13 February 1968, the Government made the following submissions. "(May it please the Court to) declare: that the measures taken by the Austrian authorities, which are the subject of the application lodged by Fritz Neumeister against the Republic of Austria and of the Report of the European Commission of Human Rights of 27 May 1966, according to Article 31 (art. 31), of the European Convention on Human Rights, do not conflict with the obligations arising from the said Convention." AS TO THE LAW 1. The Court is called upon to decide whether Neumeister has been a victim of violations of the Convention by the Austrian judicial authorities with respect to the facts referred to in that part of his Application of 12 July 1963 which the Commission declared admissible on 6 July 1964. These facts relate to the length of detention of Neumeister, who at the time of the filing of his Application had already been detained without a break for a period of one year, to the length of the proceedings against him and to the circumstances in which his various requests for release were determined. 2. The provisions of the Convention which are relevant to the examination of these questions are: (a) as regards the length of Neumeister’s detention on remand, Article 5 (3) (art. 5-3); (b) as regards the length of the proceedings against him, Article 6 (1) (art. 6-1); (c) as regards the failure to observe the principle of "equality of arms" in the examination of his requests for release, Articles 5 (4) and 6 (1) (art. 5-4, art. 6-1), or possibly these two Articles read in conjunction.