Human rights / Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment

The present case concerns numerous refusals of the Polish authorities to examine the applicants’ requests for international protection, their denied entry to Poland and return to Belarus

13 October 2022 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Effective remedy - Entry / Exit - Expulsion - Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment | Countries: Belarus - Poland - Russian Federation

1. The case concerns removal of the applicant to Tajikistan, in breach of an interim measure issued by the Court, and the conditions and lawfulness of the applicant’s detention pending removal. Articles 3, 5 and 34 of the Convention are, principally, invoked.

29 March 2022 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Topic(s): Arbitrary arrest and detention - Expulsion - Extradition - Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment | Countries: Russian Federation - Tajikistan

10 February 2022 | Judicial Body: UN Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC) | Document type: Case Law | Legal Instrument: 1989 Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) | Topic(s): Children's rights - Effective remedy - Exhaustion of domestic remedies - Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment - Right to health | Countries: Russian Federation - Switzerland

Relying on Article 2 (right to life) and Article 3 (prohibition on inhuman or degrading treatment), the applicants complain that their expulsion to Syria would put them at grave physical risk. Some of the applicants also complain under Article 13 (right to an effective remedy) that they had no effective domestic remedies in respect of their complaints under Articles 2 and 3 that their detention pending removal was arbitrary and the examination of their complaints against detention orders was not speedy.

14 September 2021 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Topic(s): Arbitrary arrest and detention - Effective remedy - Expulsion - Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment - Non-refoulement - Right to life | Countries: Russian Federation - Syrian Arab Republic

The applicants alleged that the Polish authorities had repeatedly denied them the possibility of lodging an application for international protection, in breach of Article 3 of the Convention. They also invoked Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 to the Convention, alleging that their situation had not been reviewed individually and that they were victims of a general policy that was followed by the Polish authorities with the aim of reducing the number of asylum applications registered in Poland. The applicants stated that, under Article 13 in conjunction with Article 3 of the Convention and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 to the Convention, lodging an appeal against a decision denying someone entry into Poland did not constitute an effective remedy as it would not be examined quickly enough, would have no suspensive effect and would not be examined by an independent body. Moreover, the applicants complained that the Polish authorities had not complied with the interim measures granted to them by the Court, in breach of Article 34 of the Convention.

23 July 2020 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Access to procedures - Effective remedy - Expulsion - Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment | Countries: Belarus - Poland - Russian Federation

The French authorities had failed in their duties under domestic law. They were found responsible for the conditions in which the applicants had been living for several months: sleeping rough, without access to sanitary facilities, having no means of subsistence and constantly in fear of being attacked or robbed. The applicants had thus been victims of degrading treatment, showing a lack of respect for their dignity. The Court found that such living conditions, combined with the lack of an appropriate response from the French authorities and the fact that the domestic courts had systematically objected that the competent bodies lacked resources in the light of their status as single young men, had exceeded the threshold of severity for the purposes of Article 3 of the Convention. The three applicants N.H., K.T. and A.J. had thus found themselves, through the fault of the French authorities, in a situation that was incompatible with Article 3 of the Convention.

2 July 2020 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment - Reception - Refugee status determination (RSD) / Asylum procedures | Countries: Afghanistan - France - Georgia - Iran, Islamic Republic of - Russian Federation

The Court applied the relevant general principles established in its jurisprudence in the case of F.G. v. Sweden (no. 43611/11) and in the context of removals from Russia to Central Asian States in Mamazhonov v. Russia (no. 17239/13): a) When examining the existence of substantial grounds for believing that the applicant faces a real risk of ill-treatment, the Court recalled that individuals whose extradition was sought by the Uzbek authorities on charges of religiously or politically motivated crimes constituted vulnerable groups facing a real risk of treatment contrary to Article 3 of the Convention in the event of their removal to Uzbekistan. The Court found that the applicant was accused of religiously motivated crimes on the basis of documents from the Uzbek authorities. It further considered that the Russian authorities had at their disposal sufficiently substantiated complaints pointing to a real risk of ill-treatment (§15-18). b) With respect to the duty to assess claims of a real risk of ill-treatment through reliance on sufficient relevant material, the Court concluded that the Russian authorities failed to assess the applicant’s claim adequately. The Court paid particular attention to the fact that domestic authorities did not carry out a rigorous scrutiny of the applicant’s and to the national courts’ simplistic rejections of the applicant’s claims (§19-21). c) On the existence of a real risk of ill-treatment or danger to life in their countries of origin, the Court reiterated that it has consistently concluded that the removal of an applicant charged with religiously motivated crimes in Uzbekistan exposes that applicant to a real risk of ill-treatment there (see for example: T.M. and Others v. Russia, no. 31189/15) (§22-23).

3 December 2019 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Topic(s): Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment | Countries: Kazakhstan - Russian Federation - Uzbekistan

The Court found in particular that Article 5 was applicable to the applicants’ case as their presence in the transit zone had not been voluntary; they had been left to their own devices for the entire period of their stay, which had lasted between five and 19 months depending on the applicant; there had been no realistic prospect of them being able to leave the zone; and the authorities had not adhered to the domestic legislation on the reception of asylum-seekers. Given the absence of a legal basis for their being confined to the transit zone, a situation made worse by them being impeded in accessing the asylum system, the Court concluded that there had been a violation of the applicants’ rights protected by Article 5 § 1. The conditions the applicants had lived in had also been appalling: they had had to sleep in the transit zone, a busy and constantly lit area, with no access to washing or cooking facilities. There had thus also been a breach of Article 3 as their treatment had been degrading.

21 November 2019 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Airports - Arbitrary arrest and detention - Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment - Prison or detention conditions - Right to liberty and security - Transit | Countries: Iraq - Palestine, State of - Russian Federation - Somalia - Syrian Arab Republic

The Court further notes that the move in international law towards adopting alternative measures to the administrative detention of migrants appears to concern not only children, but also their parents. violation of the applicants’ rights under Article 5 § 4 of the Convention on account of the failure of both the Istanbul Magistrates’ Court and the Constitutional Court to conduct a review of the lawfulness of their detention in an effective and speedy manner. The Court notes, once again, that the review mechanism set out under Law no. 6458 appears to be wholly ineffective in a case, such as the present one, where the detention of a minor in the immigration context is not based on an administrative decision.

17 October 2019 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Document type: Case Law | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Arbitrary arrest and detention - Effective remedy - Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment - Prison or detention conditions - Right to liberty and security | Countries: Russian Federation - Türkiye