Russia

ECHR Rules Russia Can Compensate Prisoners for Inadequate Detention Conditions

By: Genna Amick

Journal of Global Rights and Organizations, Associate Articles Editor

MOSCOW, Russia – On April 9, 2020, the European Court of Human Rights (“ECHR”) ruled on the admissibility of six applicants who applied for compensatory damages under Russia’s 2019 Compensation Act.

Entering into force in January 2020, the Compensation Act provides detainees who are held in pre-trial detention facilities with financial compensation if they suffered from inadequate detention conditions that violated national or international standards. Russia adopted the Compensation Act in response to rulings from two earlier cases from the ECHR, which required that Russia take action regarding the inhumane, degrading conditions of their pre-trial detention centers.

One of the main issues faced by pre-trial detention centers in Russia is overcrowding. This has been a problem for years, likely due to Russian courts approving prosecutorial requests for pre-trial custody in 90.7% of cases. The complaints of the six applicants in this case all involve alleged overcrowding.

The applicants, who filed on various dates in 2017 and 2018, relied on both Article 3 and Article 13 of the European Convention. Article 3 prohibits inhuman or degrading treatment. Applicants used Article 13, which ensures the right to an effective remedy, to complain that Russia lacked an effective domestic remedy for their inhumane pre-trial detention conditions. Although the applicants filed their complaints two to three years before the Compensation Act went into effect, the Court did not review their applications until after the Act was in effect. Therefore, all six applicants’ claims were deemed inadmissible as the Court held that the Compensation Act is an effective domestic remedy to their claims.

The ECHR found the Compensation Act to be an effective method of compensatory redress for applicants who had already been released from a pre-trial detention center but had suffered through improper detention conditions while there. The Court based this ruling on a number of factors, such as that the remedy has the requisite procedural guarantees, it is accessible to the people who may need it, and it offers applicants a reasonable likelihood of success. The Court also based their decision on an assumption that claims would be processed in a reasonable time period and that compensation would be paid promptly to applicants who qualified for redress.

The Court stated that released detainees may qualify for compensation under the Compensation Act if, during their detention, they did not receive the standard amount of space per detainee that is required under Article 3 of the European Convention, which is 3 square meters per detainee. All six applicants’ complaints alleged they received less than 3 square meters; therefore, they are all eligible to apply for redress under the Compensation Act. Since the applicants at issue filed a few years before the Act went into effect, they have 180 days from the publication of the ECHR’s ruling to avail themselves of the remedy provided by the Compensation Act.

Despite the ECHR finding the Compensation Act to be an effective remedy for released detainees, the ECHR reserved their judgment on whether the Act can be effective as a preventative remedy for applicants who are still being detained.

For further information, please see:

HUDOC – Shmelev and Others v. Russia – remedies for complaints about poor conditions of detention – 9 Apr. 2020

Human Rights Watch – Russia’s Pretrial Prisons Vulnerable as COVID-19 Spreads – 24 Mar. 2020

Russia’s Criminal Investigation Procedures Don’t Comply with Convention on Human Rights

By: Jacob Tyson

Impunity Watch Staff Writer

STRASBOURG, France – On February 4, 2020, the European Court of Human Rights (“ECHR”) found the Russian government responsible for 29 cases of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment by police officers, violations of Article 3 and Article 13 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, and awarded 835,000 euros in pecuniary damages to the victims. The treatment the victims received included electric shock, strangulation, needles being placed under fingernails, rape, and threats of torture toward family members.

Man is arrested by Russian law enforcement. Photo Courtesy of The Moscow Times/AP.

The case revolved around whether the complaints were credible and admissible even though they relied on faulty investigations. The Court opined that medical examinations, especially in cases of ill-treatment toward prisoners and detainees, are an essential safeguard of human life and the justice process. However, without this information, human rights investigations can be inadmissible in court. Here, multiple applicants were not examined until weeks after their complaints of torture. Upon examination, the forensic experts were not provided with enough information which made it impracticable for the experts to create an accurate picture of what happened to these prisoners. The experts, instead, relied on the pre-investigation inquiry by the Russian authorities.

According to the Court, this was an inadequate effort by the Russian government. The Court held that the mere carrying out of a pre-investigation inquiry under the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation is insufficient to comply with Article 3 of the Convention. “It is incumbent on the authorities to institute criminal proceedings and conduct a proper criminal investigation in which a full range of investigative measures are carried out,” the Court wrote.

This could have a significant impact on criminal procedure in Russia, as well as other Council of Europe member states, to ensure more thorough and accurate investigations into police brutality and inhumane prison practices. However, since 2015, Russian President, Vladimir Putin, signed a bill allowing the Constitutional Court to circumvent rulings of the ECHR and any other rulings by international human rights bodies in an effort to protect Russian legal sovereignty. It is unlikely this ruling will affect the way Russia conducts its investigations in the future or in its 15,000 currently pending ECHR applications.

For further information, please see:

European Court of Human Rights – Applications nos. 47821/09 against Russia – 4 Feb. 2020

МБХ – ЕСПЧ Присудил Россиянам 1 Млн Евро за Незаконные Обыски и Пытки в Полиции – 4 Feb. 2020

The Moscow Times – Russia Ordered to Pay $1M to Police Brutality Victims – 5 Feb. 2020

Russian Federation Violated Rights of Asylum-Seekers Trapped in Moscow Airport

By: Benjamin Kaufman

Journal of Global Rights and Organizations, Associate Articles Editor

MOSCOW, Russian Federation – On November 21, 2019, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (“ECHR”) affirmed a decision by the Chamber from 2017 declaring that the Russian Federation’s confinement of four individuals who sought asylum was a violation of their rights under Article 5 § 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights and Article 3 of the European Convention’s prohibition of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment.

The four applicants in this case were an Iraqi national, an individual holding a passport issued by the Palestinian Authority, a Somalian national, and a Syrian national. The four travelled independently and under different circumstances to Sheremetyevo airport in Moscow seeking asylum to the Russian Federation. Upon arrival, each of the four were stopped from leaving the “transit zone” within the airport while their asylum applications were submitted and processed. The transit zone of the airport was a constantly lit area in which they were required to sleep on mattresses placed within the constantly lit boarding area of the airport, without access to running water for a shower, and with only food rations provided by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (“UNHCR”).

The individuals were unable to appeal or expedite the processing of their evaluation for asylum and were prevented from exiting the airport. In sum, three of individuals spent between five and eight months between 2015 and 2016 in the airport, while the fourth was in the zone for one year and eleven months between April 9, 2015 and March 9, 2017. By the time of the EHCR’s decision, the Iraqi and Syrian applicants were resettled by the UNHCR in Denmark and Sweden respectively while the other applicants took flights to Egypt and Mogadishu.

Three of the individuals filed their applications to the ECHR on December 12, 2015 while the fourth was lodged on January 14, 2016. The applications argued that their confinement had violated their Article 5 right to liberty and security under the European Convention on Human Rights and additionally that the conditions of the confinement were so abhorrent as to constitute inhuman and degrading treatment per Article 3 of the European Convention.

The Grand Chamber affirmed the earlier decision, finding that Article 5 applied to and was violated in the case of each of the four applicants. Further, the court found Russia’s confinement of the applicants to indeed be a violation of Article 3. The ECHR took particular care to dismiss the government’s contention that none of the applicants were on Russian territory while kept in the transit zone and that Russian laws therefore did not apply to them. The court was quick to assert that in fact the applicants were within Russian territory during the periods of their confinement and that their confinement was thus subject to the Russian statutory procedures for seeking asylum.

With respect to these claims, the EHCR noted that its decision in this case would be relevant to other states challenged by the influx of refugees and migrants. However, the Grand Chamber of the EHCR specifically stated that the burdens on states due to asylum-seekers, migrants, and refugees could not be used to justify degrading and inhumane treatment of the same in violation of the human rights enshrined within the European Convention.

For further information, please see:

European Court of Human Rights – Asylum-seekers’ confinement to an airport transit zone for a long time in poor conditions violated their human rights – 21 Nov. 2019

European Court of Human Rights – Asylum seekers’ detention in Moscow airport transit zone was unlawful, inhuman and degrading – 21 Mar. 2017

Russian Film Producer’s Freedom of Expression Rights Violated

By: Mujtaba Ali Tirmizey

Impunity Watch Staff Writer

MOSCOW, Russia — On September 10, 2019, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) held that the refusal to grant a film reproduction license is a violation of Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights which concerns freedom of expression. 

Russian national, Sergey Pryanishnikov, is a producer who owns the copyright for over 1,500 erotic films. After receiving approval for public distribution of his films, Pryanishnikov’s application for a film reproduction license was rejected by the Russian Ministry of the Press in 2003 because he was deemed to be “involved in illegal production, advertising and distribution of erotic and pornographic material and films.”

In 2004, Pryanishnikov contested the rejection before the Commercial Court of Moscow, but the court upheld the decision. The court reasoned that while Pryanishnikov had never been officially charged with the distribution of pornography and had only been interrogated by the police as a witness, since no determination had yet been made in the criminal proceedings, “it could not be ruled out that he was involved in the illegal production of pornographic films.”

Later in 2004, the Appeal Court and Court of Cassation upheld the judgment of the lower courts with both courts using similar reasoning to make their decision. In 2005, relying on Article 10, Pryanishnikov filed a complaint with the ECHR.

The Court concluded that the refusal to issue a film reproduction license interfered with Pryanishnikov’s freedom of expression. The Court conceded that protecting morals and the rights of others, in particular shielding children from access to pornographic material, were justifiable goals. However, when determining whether the interference was also “necessary in a democratic society”, the Court noted that the lower court decisions had been based on assumptions rather than reasoned findings of fact. More specifically, the Russian courts did not rely on any document from the criminal case file indicating that Pryanishnikov was suspected of that offense. As a matter of fact, they had explicitly mentioned that he had been involved in the investigation as a witness rather than a suspect.

Additionally, the Court stated that the lower courts did not weigh either the impact their decision would have on Pryanishnikov’s ability to distribute all the films for which he had distribution certificates or his freedom of expression in general. In particular, they failed to perform a balancing test between the right to freedom of expression and the need to protect public morals and the rights of others, resulting in an unjustifiable restriction of freedom of expression. 

This decision is significant because it overturned four consecutive domestic judgments suppressing freedom of expression in Russia. Ideally, following this ECHR decision, citizens’ rights to freedom of expression in other member states will be respected more. By applying the suggested balancing test, future freedom of expression decisions might be more uniform and proportionally reasoned to reach sound judgments. 

For further information, please see:

European Court of Human Rights – Film Reproduction License Refused Because of Mere Suspicions: Violation of the Right to Freedom of Expression – 10 Sept. 2019

BAILII – Case of Pryanishnikov v. Russia – 10 Sept. 2019