Case Law

14 January 2021 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Decision on admissibility | Countries: Russian Federation - Ukraine

The case mainly concerns the applicants’ complaints, under Article 5 of the Convention, that their arrest and detention as migrants in an irregular situation were unlawful, and that they were not informed of the reasons for their arrest and had no effective access to the procedure to challenge the lawfulness of their arrest and detention. It also concerns the eighth applicant’s complaint under Article 3 that she, a minor at the time, was not provided with adequate care in detention in connection with her pregnancy and the miscarriage she suffered.

16 July 2020 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Access to procedures - Arbitrary arrest and detention - Right to liberty and security | Countries: Eritrea - Guinea - Somalia - Ukraine

The applicant complained that the Slovakian authorities, having arrested him after he had crossed from Ukraine, had failed to inform him of the reasons for his arrest, in violation of Article 5 § 2 of the Convention. They had then returned him to Ukraine, where he had been detained in inadequate conditions in disregard of his alleged status as a minor, in breach of Article 3. He had been unable to participate effectively in the proceedings concerning his detention, and had eventually been returned to Afghanistan in the absence of an adequate assessment of the risks he had faced there, in breach of Article 3, Article 5 §§ 1, 2 and 4, and Article 13 of the Convention. Lastly, he alleged, under Article 34, that an NGO representative had been denied access to him in Ukraine, preventing him from lodging an application for an interim measure with the Court.

11 June 2020 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Children's rights - Expulsion - Freedom from torture, inhuman and degrading treatment - Immigration Detention - Legal representation / Legal aid - Rejected asylum-seekers | Countries: Afghanistan - Slovakia - Ukraine

In January 2015, the applicant’s house was destroyed by ordnances. A commission examined the level of destruction and recognized it as inevitable. The applicant referred to the court claiming a compensation according to the Civil Protection Code, the Law on combatting terrorism and the Protocol 1 to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). The requested amount of compensation was 1 156 356,50 UAH. The applicant’s claim was rejected in the lower instance courts. The applicant appealed the decisions of the lower-instance courts and reached the Supreme Court. The latter decided that the applicant is entitled to compensation due to the state’s failure to elaborate the relevant compensation mechanism as a protection measure of the property right. Ukraine is now obliged to compensate for the damaged housing under Protocol 1 to the ECHR. There is no clear mechanism on the payment of compensations though. Therefore, the Court assigned 100,000 UAH of compensation from the State Budget of Ukraine, which is much lower than an applicant requested. However, the decision is final and cannot be disputed in Ukraine.

25 March 2020 | Judicial Body: Ukraine: Supreme Court | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Rule of law / Due process / Procedural fairness - Ukrainians | Countries: Ukraine

On 4 September 2019, the Supreme Court adopted its Resolution with regard to compensation for destroyed commercial premises caused by acts of terrorism. On 4 November 2016, the applicant referred to a first-instance court, requesting a compensation for her commercial premises destroyed during the Anti-terrorist operation (ATO) in Mariupol. The main argumentation was based on the lack of a special order regulating payment of compensation for the ATO consequences in Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts and applicability of relevant European Court of Human Rights jurisprudence. A first-instance court stated that Ukraine should compensate damages/destructions caused by an act of terrorism from the State Budget funds irrespective of Ukraine’s culpability. Simultaneously, the state preserves the right of recourse claim on reimbursing compensation from those liable for acts of terrorism. The Court of Appeals supported this decision. The Supreme Court stated that under Protocol 1 to the European Human Rights Convention an applicant has a right to claim compensation for her damaged or destroyed property irrespective of the fact that the national legal framework on compensatory mechanism is non-existent. It underlined that there is a need to clarify which obligations of the state were violated. Non-fulfilment of positive obligations (introducing a legal framework to ensure that property right violated in the course of the conflict may be effectively protected) or negative obligations (which requires non-interference with the peaceful ownership) will result in the different level of compensation. Since the decisions of lower instance courts did not clarify which particular obligations of the state (positive or negative) were violated, the Supreme Court re-submitted this case to a first-instance court for re-examination.

4 September 2019 | Judicial Body: Ukraine: Supreme Court | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): Terrorism - Ukrainians | Countries: Ukraine

15 March 2016 | Judicial Body: Council of Europe: European Court of Human Rights | Legal Instrument: 1950 European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) | Topic(s): HIV and AIDS - Right to family life | Countries: Kazakhstan - Moldova, Republic of - Russian Federation - Ukraine - Uzbekistan