STRASBOURG, France – On November 24th, The European Court of Human Rights (“ECHR”) found that the Russian Federation violated the European Convention on Human Rights in their handling of criminal proceedings against applicant Konstantin Aleksandrovic Kotov. The court found that Kotov’s punishments were disproportionate, and he had been punished for actions protected under the Convention.
Russian Police arrest activist Konstantin Aleksandrovic Kotov. Photo Courtesy of Amnesty International.
The case related to convictions Kotov received under administrative and criminal law proceedings regarding public political protests and encouraging others to attend those protests. The protected conduct the Russian Federation punished him for included chanting anti-government slogans, participating in peaceful protests, and calling upon others to do the same.
The Constitutional Court of the ECHR referenced their previous rulings in determining that the sentence was disproportionate. The Court has held that sentencing a person to prison for assembling was only possible when the assembly is not peaceful, where significant harm is inflicted, or where there was real threat of significant harm.
Kotov’s original trial in Moscow lasted less than a day and had a complicated procedural history in Russia itself before reaching the ECHR. His original trial lasted less than a day and he earned a four year sentence in prison for violating Russia’s notorious Article 212.1. The Constitutional Court of Russia remanded the case and the sentence was reduced to a year and a half.
This case is part of a larger effort repress political competition on the part of the Russian Federation, and represents only the first time Mr. Kotov was been targeted. The Russian Federation uses vague anti-extremism laws to prosecute opposition. The Russian court system has prosecuted members of the media under legislation that labels them as “foreign agents,” “undesirables” or “extremists.”
Following this arrest, the Russian government arrested Kotov again in 2024 for donating to Alexei Navalny’s political organizations. The Russian government had labeled them as “extremist.” In August 2024, A Moscow court ruled to place Kotov under house arrest until October. The donation in question was 3,000 rubles, equivalent to $32.60 USD.
THE HAGUE, Netherlands – On December 12, 2024, the ICC’s Pre-Trial Chamber III scheduled a confirmation of charges hearing in the case of The Prosecutor v. Joseph Kony. The hearing will take place September 9, 2025, marking the first time in the Court’s history that it conducts a hearing in absentia, as Kony remains at large.
Two child soldiers of Uganda’s rebel group, the Lords Resistance Army (LRA). Photo Courtesy of Reuters.
Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) fighters in the Central African Republic, picture dated April 4, 2012. Photo Courtesy of Voice of America.
Between 1987 and 2006, Northern Uganda endured a brutal conflict between the government and the Lord’s Residence Army (LRA), a quasi-religious group claiming to defend the Acholi ethnic group. Since rising in the early 1980s, the LRA has allegedly targeted civilians with attacks, abducted over 35,000 children as soldiers and sex slaves, and displaced over 1.9 million people into government camps. Despite a 2006 truce, the LRA is said to have expanded its operations into neighboring countries, including the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), South Sudan, and the Central African Republic (CAR). Despite global efforts to detain him, LRA founder and leader Joseph Kony remains at large, believed to be outside of Uganda.
After ratifying the Rome Statute in 2002, Uganda became the first state to refer itself to the ICC, inviting the Office of the Prosecutor to investigate the LRA’s alleged crimes. Kony’s Warrant of Arrest, originally issued by the ICC under seal on July 8, 2005, was made public on October 13, 2005.
Kony faces 36 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity under Articles 7 and 8 of the Rome Statute for crimes allegedly committed between 2002 and 2005.
Counts 1-14: Intentionally directing attacks against the civilian population as such; murdering civilians and attempting to do so; torturing, and/or severely abusing and mistreating civilians and treating them cruelly; enslaving abducted civilians; pillaging and destroying property; and persecuting civilians on political grounds as well as based on their age and gender.
Counts 15-29: Conscription of children into the LRA, and using them to participate actively in hostilities.
Counts 20-36: Perpetrating the crimes of enslavement, forced marriage, torture, and sexual slavery in relation to young women.
The confirmation of charges hearing is not a trial. Under Article 61(5) of the Rome Statute, a Pre-Trail hearing assesses whether sufficient evidence exists to establish substantial grounds for believing the individual committed each alleged crime. The Prosecutor may rely on documentary or summary evidence and need not call the witnesses expected to testify at the trial.
Under the Rome Statute, confirmation of charges proceedings at the Pre-Trial stage may proceed in the suspect’s absence under specific conditions outlined in Article 61(2)(b). In this instance, the Chamber determined that the conditions were met because (i) Kony qualifies as a person who “cannot be found”; (ii) all reasonable efforts have been made to ensure his appearance and notify him of the charges and the hearing date; and (iii) there is sufficient cause to hold the confirmation of charges hearing in absentia. In absentia cases, the person shall be represented by counsel where the Pre-Trial Chamber determines that it is in the interests of justice.
If the charges are confirmed, the case can proceed to trial only if the accused is physically present before the Trial Chamber under Rome Statute Article 63.
MYANMAR—On November 27, 2024, the ICC Prosecutor Karim Khan submitted an application to the ICC’s judicial division to issue an arrest warrant for Min Aung Hlaing, the acting President of Myanmar, for crimes against humanity of deportation and persecution of the Rohingya. This application came after extensive investigations by the Office of the Prosecutor from 2019—2024. ICC judges must now decide whether the application meets the standard for issuing an arrest warrant.
Min Aung Hlaing, acting President of Myanmar. Photo courtesy of Ye Aung Thu/Agence France-Presse, Getty Images.
Although the Rohingya, a Muslim ethnic minority, have lived in Myanmar for centuries, they have never been recognized as an official ethnic group and have been denied citizenship since 1982, making them the world’s largest stateless population and vulnerable to exploitation and sexual and gender-based violence and abuse. The Rohingya have experienced decades of discrimination and violence leading to frequent waves of human rights violations. However, 2017 marked the largest mass displacement of the minority group as the military burned entire villages, killed thousands of families, and partook in other human rights violations. As a result, more than 2.6 million Rohingya were internally displaced and almost one million sought refuge in Bangladesh. In 2021, the Myanmar military seized power in a coup led by Min Aung Hlaing, sentencing then-president Aung San Suu Kyi to 17 years in prison. This shift in power set off another wave of violence and triggered a new refugee crisis.
Before Myanmar’s current self-appointed prime minister led the 2021 coup, Min Aung Hlaing was a career army officer and commander in chief since 2011, with a reputation for attacks on ethnic groups. Since 2021, his regime has cracked down violently against political opposition, imprisoned pro-democracy protesters, and threatened punishment for civilians who refused to join the military. Under his command, over 27,000 people have been arrested and 21,000 are still detained, and more than 260 people were reportedly tortured to death.
The ICC’s legal process for sentencing a perpetrator of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and/or crimes of aggression takes part in 6 steps. First, the Office of the Prosecutor determines whether there is sufficient evidence of crimes that fall within the ICC’s jurisdiction. Second, the Prosecution submits an application to judges to issue an arrest warrant, which is what the Prosecutor asked of the ICC judiciary on November 27 of this year. Third, the pretrial stage marks the initial appearance of the suspect before the judges, as well as a confirmation of charges where the judges decide if there is enough evidence to go to trial after hearing each sides’ arguments. Fourth, in the trial stage, the prosecution tries to prove the guilt of the accused beyond a reasonable doubt, the judges issue a verdict and, if found guilty, a sentence for up to 30 years, or, up to life in special circumstances. Fifth, both sides may appeal the verdict and sentence. Finally, if the verdict is not overturned, the accused serves his or her sentence in a member state that has agreed to enforce ICC sentences.
The ICC’s Prosecutor’s application for an arrest warrant for Min Aung Hlaing was met with support from several different countries, as well as the Rohingyas and the country’s National Unity Government (which was established by elected lawmakers after the 2021 coup), who urged the ICC judges to swiftly issue the warrant and called on ICC member states to enforce the warrant to “uphold justice and international law.” If the ICC judiciary decides to issue the warrant, however, there are other procedural roadblocks in the way to Min Aung Hlaing’s arrest, as Myanmar is not an ICC member state, and the acting President rarely travels to states that are members who can serve an arrest warrant.
Slovakia – The ECHR held that the State of Slovakia violated a woman’s Article 4 rights which protect from slavery and forced labor and required the State to pay 41,000 Euros in damages.
The European Court of Human Rights Headquarters, which recently heard B.B. v. Slovakia. Photo Courtesy of the European Court of Human Rights.
Applicant B.B., a Slovak national, was initially raised in State care before moving in with a family, for whom she worked as a maid. She eventually was kicked out of the home and found herself homeless. In 2010, it was arranged by an unnamed party, “Y”, for B.B. to go to the United Kingdom with him, work as a prostitute, manage his household all while earning no money. With no other alternative to homelessness, B.B. went willingly.
Two years later she was taken in by the Salvation Army and returned to Slovakia in 2012 under a program for the support and protection of victims of human trafficking. She was then registered with a state supported charity for human trafficking victims, Charita, until the government ultimately informed the charity that “Y” was charged with pimping instead of human trafficking; the group then had no choice but to release her from their care.
This misstep did not cease Charita’s efforts to support the applicant as they continued to send information concerning the ordeal in the UK to the Banska Bystrica police. The force noted the human trafficking concerns, but, due to jurisdictional issues, the case was sent to the Humenne police force who treated the conduct as pimping despite investigators from the UK concluding that B.B. had been trafficked.
In November of 2015, Y was found guilty of pimping and sentenced to one-year in prison, a far shorter sentence than that of a human trafficking conviction. The judgment was appealed to and affirmed by the regional court. In 2017, both the Minister of Justice and B.B. herself launched 3 total complaints each of which were unsuccessful in the Supreme Court.
The complaints specified that the Slovakian authorities’ failure to treat the offense as one of human trafficking had violated B.B.’s rights under Article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights. This article, meant to prohibit slavery and forced labor, includes an obligation to carry out an effective investigation into a credible suspicion of human trafficking; the state did not conduct such an investigation.
Eventually, this case was brought to the European Court of Human Rights in September 2021. The court had two issues to resolve:
Whether the State was obligated, under Article 4 of the Convention, to carry out an effective investigation into the credible claim of human trafficking.
Whether the State complied with such an obligation, if it existed.
The evidence of this case supported the presence of such credible suspicion of human trafficking especially when considering B.B.’s vulnerability and lack of a reasonable alternative. The court held that Article 4 does create an obligation to critically investigate national and transnational trafficking regardless of whether it was a part of an organized scheme or whether it was an independent instance. The court found that the State did not uphold its obligation and thus violated B.B.’s article 4 rights.
The initial categorization of this conduct as pimping, rather than human trafficking, permitted “Y” to escape liability for violating a fundamental human right. This violation persisted when the State failed to investigate despite sufficient evidence and numerous appeals. The lenient sentencing on this matter undermines deterrence, safety, and effectiveness of both Slovakia’s counter-trafficking efforts and the Convention of Human Rights as a whole.
Ultimately Slovakia has to pay B.B. 26,000 euros in respect of non-pecuniary damages as well as 15,000 euros with respect to litigation costs and expenses.
STRASBOURG, FRANCE- On October 8, 2024, in the case of M.A and Z.R v. Cyprus, the ECHR ruled that the Cypriot government violated the rights of Syrian refugees seeking asylum in Cyprus.
Photo of refugees on a Cypriot Marine Police boat after being rescued from their own sunken boat off the southeastern coast of Cyprus. Photo courtesy of Petros Karadjias.
M.A. and Z.R. are Syrian nationals who fled their home, Idlib, Syria, in January of 2016 for their own safety and to escape civil war. They ended up in Lebanon where they stayed in camps run by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). While at these camps, they allege that there was no access to healthcare or employment opportunities, and they were not entitled to their basic rights. Fearing that they might be sent back to Syria, seeing as Lebanon was sending Syrians back home after the Beirut explosion of 2020, they decided to seek asylum in Cyprus.
To obtain asylum in Cyprus, M.A. and Z.R. paid smugglers $2,500 each. They had set sail in early September of 2020 on a boat with 30 other refugees. When arriving at the territorial waters of Cyprus, their boat was intercepted by the Cypriot coastguard. They were told that they could not continue their journey, even after M.A. and Z.R. explained their situation. On September 8, after 2 days of being stranded at sea under the control of the Cypriot Marine Police, they were forced onto another boat and sent back to Lebanon where the Lebanese police questioned and detained them before letting them go. As of today, M.A. and Z.R. still live in Lebanon under the UNHCR.
M.A. and Z.R. brought this suit against the Cypriot court, claiming that their refusal of asylum procedure and forcible departure back to Lebanon violated Article 3, Article 4 of Protocol No.4, and Article 13 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
The Cypriot government, on the other hand, argued that they returned M.A. and Z.R. back to Lebanon on the basis of a bilateral agreement between Cyprus and Lebanon, which provided for readmission of individuals who entered Cyprus unlawfully. The Cypriot Government contended Lebanon is a safe third country because they (1) have a good relationship with Lebanon and (2) because of the UNHCR and the presence of other UN bodies there to help refugees.
ECHR RULING
The ECHR ruled in favor of M.A. and Z.R., stating that the Cypriot government violated Article 3, Article 4 of Protocol No.4, and Article 13 of the Convention by refusing them asylum and forcibly sending them back to Lebanon without reviewing their claims and circumstances.
Violation Under Article 3
Article 3 of the Convention conveys that no person shall be subjected to degrading or inhumane treatments. The court stated that it cannot overlook the fact that M.A. and Z.R. were stranded at sea for two days under Cypriot authority just to be forcibly sent back to Lebanon without even having their asylum claims investigated.
The Court also stated that Cypriot officials should have known of the various shortcomings of the Lebanese asylum system and weighed the consequences of sending M.A. and Z.R. back. There is no evidence that the Cypriot officials assessed the ineffective asylum process or the living conditions of the asylum seekers there before sending them back. Cyprus officials knew or should have known of these conditions, yet they forced M.A. and Z.R. back to persecution without looking into their situation.
The Cypriot government also argued that they thought Lebanon was a safe third country because of their bilateral agreement with each other and the presence of UN bodies. In response, the Court reiterated that countries should not rely on others for their own refugee obligations.
Hence, under Article 3, the court ruled that Cyprus failed their refugee obligations and to follow the proper procedures for assessing asylum claims before sending M.A. and Z.R. back to Lebanon.
Violation Under Article 4 of Protocol No.4
Article 4 under Protocol No.4 prohibits the collective expulsion of aliens. Exceptions to this article only happen where this collective expulsion is done reasonably after proper examinations of the aliens in the group as individuals. Here, the Cypriot government did not investigate any claims of any of the refugees on the boat and still expelled them back to Lebanon.
The Court says that the purpose of this article is to prevent States from removing foreign nationals without first examining their circumstances. Here, the Court rules that Cyprus forcibly returning M.A. and Z.R. to Lebanon without investigating their circumstances and asylum claims falls under the definition of collective expulsion and they are thus in violation of Article 4 of Protocol No.4 under the Convention.
Violation Under Article 13
Article 13 expresses the right to an effective remedy. In the case present, the Cypriot authorities deprived M.A. and Z.R. of an effective remedy by not examining their claims and forcibly deporting them back to Lebanon. This article was read in conjunction with Article 3 and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4.
The ECHR has ruled on behalf of Syrian refugees and hold Cyprus liable for not following proper refugee procedure in examining the asylum claims of M.A. and Z.R. and forcibly sending them back to conditions that they were trying to escape.
There are many stories of Syrian refugees similar to M.A. and Z.R., where they have been refused of asylum procedures by Cypriot authorities and were forced back to Lebanon to face persecution and risk being sent back to Syria. This ruling can change the landscape of refugee rights and bring awareness to the inhumane treatments that the Cypriot government imposes on Syrian refugees seeking asylum.
