Judge at the European Court of Human Rights

In 1990, the new Nationalist government led by Eddie Fenech Adami nominated Bonello as Chief Justice of Malta and (ex officio) President of the Constitutional Court, as well as Judge from Malta at the European Court of Human Rights. Yet, Bonello declined the appointment, as Fenech Adami insisted Bonello should take both the positions in Malta, and in Strasbourg. Fenech Adami then appointed Giuseppe Mifsud Bonnici to both posts. ^[3]

It was then the new Labour government led by Alfred Sant, in 1998, to appoint Bonello as Maltese judge at the European Court of Human Rights, from 1 November 1998 until 31 October 2004.^[3][7] As the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe rejected the all-male list of candidates proposed by the Maltese Government to succeed him, Bonello's term was extended twice until 19 September 2010.^[8] Bonello was finally replaced by Vincent A. De Gaetano in 2010.^[9]

Bonello has been considered a liberal judge.^{[citation needed]} He has been the first judge whose separate opinions were published during his tenure, later also the separate opinions of the Portuguese judge Paulo Pinto de Albuquerque were also published in Italy. Judge (later Court President) Nicolas Bratza and leading authority on Human Rights Law Michael O'Boyle published them with Wolf Legal Publishers of the Netherlands.^[10] His separate opinions were also collected in the book When Judges Dissent, published in 2008.^[11]

Upon his retirement from the European Court of Human Rights, Court president Jean-Paul Costa said "Vanni" brought "robust independence of spirit and unflagging commitment to the protection of human rights". He displayed such qualities time and again in numerous separate opinions given in his unique and memorable style, which was "elegant as it is forceful", using "vocabulary as rich as it is rare". In fact, his opinions led Judge Bonello to attain "near-legendary" status among all those who followed Strasbourg case law, he said. President Costa said Judge Bonello was a true gentlemen who gained the respect and affection of all those who worked with him, whether they agreed with him or not. He was a marvellous ambassador for his profession and his country. "Along with his professional achievements, Vanni is a man of broad and deep culture, a connoisseur of great art and a distinguished historian. Now that he can finally take his leave of the Court, he can and will dedicate himself more fully to these intellectual and aesthetic pursuits." The president recounted an anecdote about the man he befriended during his long term at the Court. He said he had tried making a modest personal contribution to Judge Bonello's historical studies about the French occupation of Malta during the Napoleonic era, however, he soon realised his assistance was almost useless because Judge Bonello knew virtually everything there was to know on the subject.^[12]

Publications

Bonello has published several history books, some of which led Bonello to be awarded the National Book Prize by the National Book Council.^[13][14][15] He also served as president for the Malta Historical Society from 2011 to 2015.^[15][16]

Bonello also wrote a series of articles for the Times of Malta, celebrating the life of Caterina Scappi, founder of the first hospital exclusively for women in Malta: "For her absolutely pioneer social commitment, for this revolutionary philanthropy, Scappi deserves the monument she never got. Only an obscure and overlooked tombstone in the Carmelite church in Valletta today bears witness to her existence, her feminist vision and her generous, farsighted altruism."^[17][18][19]

In 2018 Bonello published Misunderstanding the Constitution, a collection of essays first published on the Times of Malta and dedicated to "How the Maltese judiciary undermines human rights". Robert Thake described it as an "indictment of the Maltese judicial system and the often-frightening condition of Malta’s human rights record". Bonello discusses the abysmal record of Maltese cases at the European Court of Human Rights (85% of Malta's Constitutional Court decisions are overturned in Strasbourg) and how Maltese judges have misunderstood key human rights notions, including by pretending that the Constitutional Court is a "Court of last instance" (rejecting as ill-founded all application that would not have "exhausted domestic remedies") and by refusing to accept the erga omnes validity of its own rulings. ^[20]