The crime cult wins before EU courts against Russia

[antisectes]

FIRST SECTION

CASE OF CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY MOSCOW v. RUSSIA

(Application no. 18147/02)

JUDGMENT

STRASBOURG

5 April 2007

This judgment will become final in the circumstances set out in Article
44 § 2 of the Convention. It may be subject to editorial revision.

In the case of Church of Scientology Moscow v. Russia,
The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting as a Chamber
composed of:
Mr C.L. Rozakis, President,
Mr L. Loucaides,
Mrs N. Vajic,
Mr A. Kovler,
Mrs E. Steiner,
Mr K. Hajiyev,
Mr D. Spielmann, judges,
and Mr S. Nielsen, Section Registrar,
Having deliberated in private on 15 March 2007,
Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:
PROCEDURE
1. The case originated in an application (no. 18147/02) against the
Russian Federation lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the
Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms
(“the Convention”) by the Church of Scientology of the city of Moscow
(“the applicant”), on 24 April 2002.
2. The applicant was represented before the Court by Mr P. Hodkin, a
lawyer practising in East Grinstead, the United Kingdom, and Ms G.
Krylova and Mr M. Kuzmichev, lawyers practising in Moscow. The Russian
Government (“the Government”) were represented by Mr P. Laptev,
Representative of the Russian Federation at the European Court of Human
Rights.
3. The applicant complained, in particular, about the domestic
authorities' refusal of its application for re-registration as a legal
entity.
4. By a decision of 28 October 2004, the Court declared the application
partly admissible.
5. The applicant and the Government each filed observations on the
merits (Rule 59 § 1).
THE FACTS
I. THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE CASE
A. Initial attempts to secure re-registration of the applicant
6. On 25 January 1994 the applicant was officially registered as a
religious association having legal-entity status under the RSFSR
Religions Act of 25 October 1990.
7. On 1 October 1997 a new Law on Freedom of Conscience and Religious
Associations (“the Religions Act”) entered into force. It required all
religious associations that had previously been granted legal-entity
status to bring their articles of association into conformity with the
Act and obtain re-registration from the competent Justice Department.
8. On 11 August 1998 the applicant submitted to the Moscow Justice
Department an application for re-registration, together with the
documents required by law.
9. On 1 June 1999 the Moscow Justice Department refused re-registration
of the applicant on the ground that its purpose and activities
contradicted the requirements of the Religions Act and violated the
Criminal Code as there was an on-going criminal investigation against
the then president of the applicant. The applicant indicated that the
investigation had been subsequently closed in the absence of indications
of a criminal offence.
10. On 29 December 1999 the applicant submitted a second application
for re-registration.
11. On 28 January 2000 the deputy head of the Moscow Justice Department
informed the applicant that the second application had been refused. He
wrote that the applicant had adopted a “new version of the Charter”,
rather than “amendments to the Charter”, and had indicated that by the
charter, the applicant “may have”, instead of “shall be entitled to
have”, attached representative offices of foreign religious
organisations. He also claimed that there had been other (unspecified)
violations of Russian laws.
12. On 10 February 2000 the then president of the applicant sent a
letter to the Moscow Justice Department inviting them to indicate
specific violations. He relied on the requirement in section 12.2 of the
Religions Act, pursuant to which the grounds for a refusal were to be
set out explicitly.
13. By a letter of 18 February 2000, the deputy head responded to the
applicant that the Justice Department was under no obligation to clarify
or review charters or other documents and that it could only carry out
legal evaluation of the submitted documents and give a decision either
to grant or to refuse re-registration.
14. On 30 May 2000, having taken further steps to remedy any supposed
defects in the documents, the applicant submitted its third application
for registration.
15. On 29 June 2000 the deputy head informed the applicant that the
application could not be processed because it had submitted an
incomplete set of documents. Following a written inquiry of the
applicant of 12 July 2000 as to what documents were missing, the deputy
head informed the applicant on 17 July 2000 that his Department was not
competent to indicate what information was missing and what additional
documents were to be submitted.
16. On 17 July 2000 the applicant submitted to the Moscow Justice
Department a fourth, more detailed application for re-registration.
17. On 19 August 2000 the Justice Department informed the applicant
that the application would not be processed because it had allegedly
submitted an incomplete set of documents. The missing documents were not
specified.
18. On 10 October 2000 the applicant submitted a fifth, still more
detailed application.
19. On 9 November 2000 the Justice Department repeated that the
applicant had submitted an incomplete set of documents and the
application would not be processed.
20. On 31 December 2000 the time-limit for re-registration of religious
organisations expired.
B. Litigation with the Justice Department
21. The president and co-founder of the applicant brought a complaint
before the Nikulinskiy District Court of Moscow against the Moscow
Justice Department's refusal to re-register the applicant.
22. On 8 December 2000 the Nikulinskiy District Court of Moscow gave
judgment, finding that the Justice Department's decision of 28 January
2000 had not had any basis in law. It established that the wordings used
in the applicant's charter were in fact identical to those contained in
the Religions Act and held that religious associations should not “be
required to reproduce the text of the law verbatim in their charter”.
The court stressed that the Justice Department could have suggested an
editorial revision of the charter without refusing the application as a
whole.
23. The District Court further held that the decision of 29 June 2000
had not been lawful, either. It established that all the documents
required by the Religions Act had been appended to the application with
the exception of a document confirming the existence of the religious
group in the given territory for no less than fifteen years. However,
that document was not necessary because, in accordance with the ruling
of the Constitutional Court, religious organisations established before
the adoption of the Religions Act were not required to confirm their
fifteen-year existence.
24. The District Court concluded that the Moscow Justice Department had
been “in essence, using subterfuges to avoid re-registration [of the
applicant]”. It pointed out that such avoidance or refusals had violated
the rights of the plaintiffs and their fellow believers guaranteed by
Article 29 and 30 of the Russian Constitution because the parishioners
whose association had no legal-entity status would not be able to rent
premises for religious ceremonies and worship, to receive and
disseminate religious literature, to have bank accounts, etc. The
District Court also held that the refusal had been inconsistent with
international standards of law, Articles 9 and 11 of the Convention and
Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
The District Court also referred to Article 7 of the United Nations
Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of
Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief and held that “the refusal to
grant legal-entity status to a religious entity imposes a practical
restriction on the right of each person to profess his/her religion in
community with others”. The District Court concluded as follows:
“Hence, the justice authorities' avoidance of re-registration of the
Church of Scientology of Moscow under far-fetched pretexts contradicts
the above mentioned laws of the Russian Federation and the international
law.”
The District Court ordered the Moscow Justice Department to re-register
the applicant.
25. The Justice Department did not appeal against the judgment and it
became binding and enforceable on 19 December 2000. However, the Moscow
Justice Department refused to comply with it.
26. On 27 December 2000 the president of the applicant obtained a writ
of execution.
27. On 4 January 2001 the applicant submitted its sixth application
along with the writ of execution mandating re-registration.
28. On 2 February 2001 the Justice Department refused to process the
application, repeating that an incomplete set of documents had been
submitted. No clarification as to the nature of the allegedly missing
document(s) was given.
29. On an unspecified date the Moscow Justice Department asked the
Moscow City prosecutor to lodge an application for supervisory review
which he did. The prosecutor's application was granted by the Presidium
of the Moscow City Court. On 29 March 2001 the Presidium quashed the
judgment of 8 December 2000 by way of supervisory review. In doing so,
it relied on the following grounds. Concerning the lawfulness of the
decision of 28 January 2000, the Presidium criticised the District Court
for the failure to verify the compliance of the amendments to the
charter submitted for re-registration on 29 December 1999 with the law.
As to the refusal of 29 June 2000, the Presidium opined that the book
Scientology: The Theology and Practice of a Contemporary Religion
(Russian edition) did not provide sufficient information on “the basic
tenets of creed and practices of the religion” as required by section
11.5 of the Religions Act and that the set of documents was therefore
incomplete. The Presidium remitted the matter for a new examination by
the District Court.
30. On 7 August 2001 the Nikulinskiy District Court gave a new
judgment. The District Court ruled in favour of the Moscow Justice
Department and dismissed the complaint about the refusal to re-register
the applicant. It found that the applicant had not complied with section
11 of the Religions Act in that (i) the application for re-registration
only included copies, rather than originals, of the charter and
registration certificate; (ii) the book submitted by the applicant did
not qualify to be the “information on the basic tenets of creed and
practices of the religion”, and (iii) the document indicating the legal
address of the applicant was missing.
31. Before the court the plaintiffs unsuccessfully argued that the
Moscow Justice Department had had in its possession the original charter
and registration certificate, as well as the applicant's legal address,
as these documents had been included in the first application for
re-registration and the Moscow Justice Department had never returned
them. The District Court concluded, nevertheless, that “the fact that
some documents were [physically] in the building of the Department did
not relieve the applicant of the obligation to submit a complete set of
documents for registration”. It affirmed that “all required documents
were to be submitted simultaneously”.
32. On 26 October 2001 the Moscow City Court upheld the judgment on
appeal, endorsing the District Court's reasoning.
33. On 16 January 2002 the applicant submitted a seventh application
for re-registration. In observance with the domestic courts' judgments
the application included (i) the original charter and registration
certificate; (ii) “information about the basic tenets of creed and
practices” in the form of a four-page document instead of a book; and
(iii) a new document confirming the legal address.
34. On 23 January 2002 a new deputy head of the Moscow Justice
Department refused to process the application on the ground that the
time-limit for re-registration of religious organisation had expired and
that a civil action for the applicant's dissolution (see below) was
pending.
35. On 30 April 2002 the Nikulinskiy District Court refused the Justice
Department's civil action for dissolution of the applicant, referring to
the Constitutional Court's decision of 7 February 2002 in the case of
The Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army, according to which a religious
organisation could only be dissolved by a judicial decision if it was
duly established that it had ceased its activity or had engaged in
unlawful activities (for a detailed description of the decision, see The
Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army v. Russia, no. 72881/01, §§ 23-24,
ECHR 2006-...). Since the applicant had on-going financial and economic
activities, maintained balance sheets and staged events in municipal
districts of Moscow, and had not commited any wrongful acts, the action
for its dissolution was dismissed. On 18 July 2002 the Moscow City Court
upheld that judgment on appeal.
D. Further attempts to secure re-registration
36. On 1 July 2002 the system for State registration of legal entities
was reformed. A new Unified State Register of Legal Entities was
established and the competence to make entries was delegated to the
Ministry for Taxes and Duties (Tax Ministry). However, in respect of
religious organisations a special procedure was retained, under which
the regional departments of the Ministry of Justice would still make the
decision of whether to register a religious organisation, whilst formal
processing of the approved application would pass to the Tax Ministry.
All existing legal entities were required to provide to local tax
authorities certain updated information about themselves by 31 December
2002.
37. On 11 July 2002 the applicant submitted its eighth application for
re-registration to the Moscow Justice Department, under the new
procedure.
38. On 9 August 2002 the Justice Department refused to process the
application, repeating that re-registration was no longer possible due
to the expiry of the time-limit.
39. On 24 September 2002, after the Moscow City Court upheld the
judgment refusing dissolution of the applicant, the applicant submitted
a ninth application for re-registration. On the same day it also
submitted the updated information required under the new procedure, to
the local registering tax authority, Moscow Tax Inspectorate no. 39.
40. On 2 October 2002 the head of the Moscow Justice Department,
responded to the applicant's letter of 2 September 2002 in the following
terms:
“...a situation exits when, on one hand, the action of the [Moscow
Justice Department] seeking dissolution of your religious organisation
has been refused, and, on the other hand, the very same court has upheld
as lawful our decisions to leave the applications and documents for
re-registration of this organisation unexamined, whereas the time-limit
for re-registration established by law has expired.”
41. On 23 October 2002 the Justice Department refused to process the
ninth application, referring to the above letter from the department
head and stating, as before, that the time-limit had passed.
42. On 29 October 2002 Moscow Tax Inspectorate no. 39 entered the
applicant on the Unified State Register of Legal Entities and issued the
registration certificate.
43. On 24 December 2002 the applicant submitted a tenth application for
re-registration, attaching the registration certificate.
44. On 24 January 2003 the Justice Department left the tenth
application unexamined, repeating once again that the time-limit had
expired.
E. Further litigation with the Justice Department
45. On 24 April 2003 the applicant lodged a complaint against the
Justice Department's persistent refusal to re-register the applicant
under the Religions Act. It argued, in particular, that the actions of
the Justice Department constituted a breach of the rights to freedom of
religion and association of the applicant and its members. It submitted
a copy of the registration certificate of 29 October 2002 and relied on
the Constitutional Court's decision of 7 February 2002.
46. On 1 September 2003 the Presnenskiy District Court of Moscow
dismissed the complaint, holding that the Religions Act did not provide
for a possibility to re-register religious organisations that had missed
the time-limit for re-registration.
47. On 22 January 2004 the Moscow City Court quashed the judgment of 1
September 2003 and remitted the case. It held as follows:
“...failure to re-register within the established time-limit cannot in
itself serve as a basis... for refusal to register amendments to the
charter... of a religious organisation upon expiry of the established
time-limit...
Refusal of registration of amendments to the founding documents of a
religious organisation restricts the rights of the organisation, and, as
a consequence, those of its members, to determine independently the
legal conditions of its existence and functioning.”
48. On 3 November 2004 the Presnenskiy District Court granted the
applicant's complaint against the Justice Department. It found that the
Religions Act could not be interpreted as restricting a religious
organisation's ability to amend its founding documents after the expiry
of the time-limit set for re-registration. The Justice Department's
decision not to process the application for registration of the amended
charter was therefore unlawful. The District Court ordered the Justice
Department to re-register the applicant by way of registering its
charter as amended in 2002.
49. On 4 February 2005 the Moscow City Court upheld the interpretation
of the Religions Act given by the District Court. However, it found that
the Justice Department was wrongly ordered to register the amended
charter without reviewing its compliance with the law. The City Court
amended the operative part of the judgment and ordered the Justice
Department to examine the applicant's application for registration in
accordance with the established procedure.
50. On 31 May 2005 the applicant re-submitted its application for
registration to the Moscow Registration Department, that is, the legal
successor of the Moscow Justice Department in matters of registration of
religious organisations following a reform of the justice system.
51. On 27 June 2005 the Moscow Registration Department informed the
applicant that its application would not be processed because it had not
submitted a document confirming its presence in Moscow for at least
fifteen years.
F. Concurrent developments
52. On 2 September 2003 the Ministry for the Press, Tele/Radio
Communications and Mass Communication rejected the applicant's
application for registration of its newspaper Religion, Law and Freedom.
The decision cited no legal grounds for the refusal and read, in its
entirety, as follows:
“We report, that after the court proceedings between [the applicant] and
[the Moscow Justice Department] have completed (that is, after the
judgment has entered into legal force), this organisation may apply
again for registration of the newspaper Religion, Law and Freedom.”
II. RELEVANT DOMESTIC LAW AND PRACTICE
A. Constitution of the Russian Federation
53. Article 29 guarantees freedom of religion, including the right to
profess either alone or in community with others any religion or to
profess no religion at all, to freely choose, have and share religious
and other beliefs and manifest them in practice.
54. Article 30 provides that everyone shall have the right to freedom
of association.
B. The Religions Act
55. On 1 October 1997 the Federal Law on the Freedom of Conscience and
Religious Associations (no. 125-FZ of 26 September 1997 – “the Religions
Act”) entered into force.
56. The founding documents of religious organisations that had been
established before the Religions Act were to be amended to conform to
the Act and submitted for re-registration. Until so amended, the
founding documents remained operative in the part which did not
contradict the terms of the Act (section 27 § 3).
57. By letter of 27 December 1999 (no. 10766-??), the Ministry of
Justice informed its departments that the Religions Act did not
establish a special procedure for re-registration of religious
organisations. Since section 27 § 3 required them to bring their
founding documents into conformity with the Religions Act, the
applicable procedure was that for registration of amendments to the
founding documents described in section 11 § 11. Section 11 § 11
provided that the procedure for registration of amendments was the same
as that for registration of a religious organisation.
58. The list of documents required for registration was set out in
section 11 § 5 and ran as follows:
“- application for registration;
- list of founders of the religious organisation indicating their
nationality, place of residence and dates of birth;
- charter (articles of association) of the religious organisation;
- minutes of the constituent assembly;
- document showing the presence of the religious group in this
territory for at least fifteen years...;
- information on the basic tenets of creed and religious practices,
including information on the origin of the religion and this
association, forms and methods of activities, views on family and
marriage, on education, particular views on health held by the religion
followers, restrictions on civil rights and obligations imposed on
members and ministers of the organisation;
- information on the address (location) of the permanent governing body
of the religious organisation, at which contact with the religious
organisation is to be maintained; and
- document on payment of the State duty.”
59. Section 12 § 1 stated that registration of a religious organisation
could be refused if:
“- aims and activities of a religious organisation contradict the
Russian Constitution or Russian laws – with reference to specific legal
provisions;
- the organisation has not been recognised as a religious one;
- the articles of association or other submitted materials do not comply
with Russian legislation or contain inaccurate information;
- another religious organisation has already been registered under the
same name;
- the founder(s) has (have) no capacity to act.”
60. Section 27 § 4 in its original wording specified that the
re-registration of religious organisations was to be completed by 31
December 1999. Subsequently the time-limit was extended until 31
December 2000. Following the expiry of the time-limit, religious
organisations were liable for dissolution by a judicial decision issued
on application of a registration authority.
C. Case-law of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation
61. Examining the compatibility with the Russian Constitution of the
requirement of the Law that all religious organisations established
before its entry into force should confirm that they have existed for at
least fifteen years, the Constitutional Court found as follows (decision
no. 16-P of 23 November 1999 in the case of Religious Society of
Jehovah's Witnesses in Yaroslavl and Christian Glorification Church):
“8. ... Pursuant to... the RSFSR Law on freedom of religion (as amended
on 27 January 1995), all religious associations – both regional and
centralised – had, on an equal basis, as legal entities, the rights that
were subsequently incorporated in the Federal Law on freedom of
conscience and religious associations...
Under such circumstances legislators could not deprive a certain segment
of religious organisations that had been formed and maintained full
legal capacity of the rights belonging to them, solely on the basis that
they did not have confirmation that they had existed for 15 years. In
relation to religious organisations created earlier, that would be
incompatible with the principle of equality enshrined in Article 13 § 4,
Article 14 § 2 and Article 19 §§ 1 and 2 of the Constitution of the
Russian Federation, and would be an impermissible restriction on freedom
of religion (Article 28) and the freedom of [voluntary] associations to
form and to carry out their activities (Article 30)...”
62. The Constitutional Court subsequently confirmed this position in
its decision no. 46-O of 13 April 2000 in the case of Independent
Russian Region of the Society of Jesus, and decision no. 7-O of 7
February 2002 in the case of The Moscow Branch of the Salvation Army.
III. RELEVANT COUNCIL OF EUROPE DOCUMENTS
63. Resolution 1278 (2002) on Russia's law on religion, adopted by the
Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe on 23 April 2002, noted,
in particular, the following:
“1. The new Russian law on religion entered into force on 1 October
1997, abrogating and replacing a 1990 Russian law – generally considered
very liberal – on the same subject. The new law caused some concern,
both as regards its content and its implementation. Some of these
concerns have been addressed, notably through the judgments of the
Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation of 23 November 1999, 13
April 2000 and 7 February 2002, and the religious communities'
re-registration exercise at federal level successfully completed by the
Ministry of Justice on 1 January 2001. However, other concerns remain.
...
5. Moreover, some regional and local departments of the Ministry of
Justice have refused to (re)register certain religious communities,
despite their registration at federal level. The federal Ministry of
Justice does not seem to be in a position to control these regional and
local departments in accordance with the requirements of the rule of
law, preferring to force religious communities to fight these local
departments over registration in the courts rather than taking remedial
action within the ministry...
6. Therefore, the Assembly recommends to the Russian authorities that:
i. the law on religion be more uniformly applied throughout the Russian
Federation, ending unjustified regional and local discrimination against
certain religious communities and local officials' preferential
treatment of the Russian Orthodox Church, and in particular their
insisting in certain districts that religious organisations obtain prior
agreement for their activities from the Russian Orthodox Church;
ii. the federal Ministry of Justice become more proactive in resolving
disputes between its local/regional officials and religious
organisations before disputes are brought before the courts, by taking
remedial action within the ministry in case of corruption and/or
incorrect implementation of the law on religion, thus rendering it
unnecessary to take such cases to the courts...”
THE LAW
I. ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLES 9, 10 AND 11 OF THE CONVENTION
64. The applicant complained under Articles 9, 10 and 11 of the
Convention that it had been arbitrarily stripped of its legal-entity
status as a result of the refusal to re-register it as a religious
organisation. The Court recalls that in a recent case it examined a
substantially similar complaint about the refusal of re-registration of
a religious organisation from the standpoint of Article 11 of the
Convention read in the light of Article 9 (see The Moscow Branch of the
Salvation Army v. Russia, no. 72881/01, §§ 74 and 75, ECHR 2006-...).
The Court observes that the religious nature of the applicant was not
disputed at the national level and it had been officially recognised as
a religious organisation since 1994. In the light of this, the Court
finds that the applicant's complaints must be examined from the
standpoint of Article 11 of the Convention read in the light of Article
9.
Article 9 provides as follows:
“1. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and
religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief
and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or
private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching,
practice and observance.
2. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs shall be subject only
to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a
democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection
of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights
and freedoms of others.”
Article 11 provides as follows:
“1. Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and to
freedom of association with others, including the right to form and to
join trade unions for the protection of his interests.
2. No restrictions shall be placed on the exercise of these rights other
than such as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic
society in the interests of national security or public safety, for the
prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals
or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others...”
A. Arguments by the parties
1. The Government
65. The Government considered that there was no interference with the
applicant's right to freedom of association because it had not been
liquidated and retained the full capacity of a legal entity. On 10
August 2002 it had been entered on the Unified State Register of Legal
Entities and continued its religious activities. In refusing the Moscow
Justice Department's action for dissolution, the Nikulinskiy District
Court founded its judgment of 30 April 2002 on the evidence showing that
the applicant had on-going financial and economic activities, such as
the applicant's balance sheets and permission to stage events in
municipal districts of Moscow. The Government maintained that the
applicant could not claim to be a “victim” of any violation solely
because it was not willing to bring its founding documents in compliance
with the existing law.
66. The Government further submitted that there was no violation of the
applicant's right to freedom of religion or any restriction on that
right. The penalty imposed on the applicant “was not harsh and was not
motivated by religious factors, but by a failure to submit to the
Religions Act and violation of the administrative procedure”. The
refusal of re-registration of the applicant did not entail a ban on its
activity. Members of the applicant continued to profess their faith,
hold services of worship and ceremonies, and guide their followers.
67. The Government pointed out that the District Court's judgment of 7
August 2001 refusing re-registration of the applicant had had a lawful
basis. The law required the original charter and registration
certificate, the information on the basic tenets of religion, and the
document indicating the legal address of the organisation. However, the
applicant had failed to produce these documents and therefore the
decision not to process the application for re-registration had been
lawful. The Government claimed that the applicant is not precluded from
lodging a new application for re-registration.
2. The applicant
68. The applicant challenged the Government's assertions that the
applicant “possessed the full capacity as a legal entity” and that it
“exercised financial, economic and other activity in full measure” as
untrue. The result of the obstruction of the Moscow Justice Department,
as upheld by the Presnenskiy District Court on 1 September 2003, was
that the applicant had been “frozen in time” and deprived of a
possibility to modify its founding documents – and, accordingly, its
aims, structure and internal organisation – in accordance with the law
and its changing needs. For example, the applicant had been barred from
introducing into its charter the right to establish places of worship
and new procedures for election and dismissal of its president.
Furthermore, the Press Ministry had denied registration of its newspaper
for no other reason than the on-going uncertainty as regards the
applicant's rights created by the refusal of re-registration. In that
context, the entering of the applicant on the Unified State Register of
Legal Entities had been made due to internal administrative reforms and
did not constitute re-registration for the purposes of the Religions
Act.
69. The applicant further contended that the Government's claim about
their “unwillingness” to amend the founding documents was, at best,
disingenuous. Having submitted ten applications for re-registration to
the Moscow Justice Department, the applicant not once refused to comply
with the requirements imposed on it, whether “prescribed by law” or
otherwise. The expiry of the time-limit without re-registration was
directly linked to the Moscow Justice Department's persistent refusal to
give any concrete explanation for rejection of applications.
Furthermore, its refusal to comply with a writ of execution was a
particularly serious abuse in that the Ministry of Justice is itself in
charge of the court bailiffs service and enforcement proceedings. No
“convincing and compelling” reasons were given by the Government for the
on-going refusal to re-register the applicant, while the grounds relied
upon in the judgment of 7 August 2001 were not “prescribed by law” as
the law required neither simultaneous production of the documents nor
any special form in which the information on “basic tenets of creed” was
to be submitted.
70. Finally, as regards the Government's claim that the applicant is
not precluded from submitting a new application for re-registration, it
is, in the applicant's view, misleading and contrary to the facts. A
presumed “opportunity to apply” is meaningless when the Moscow Justice
Department held – on at least five occasions in the nineteen months
preceding the submission of the Government's observations – that the
applicant was barred from re-registering due to the expired time-limit
for re-registration. The applicant submitted that even the most
dispassionate review of the facts disclosed a single-minded
determination on the part of the respondent State to deny
re-registration to specific religious organisations, including the
applicant, despite the lack of any “objective and reasonable
justification” for doing so.
B. The Court's assessment
1. General principles
71. The Court refers to its settled case-law to the effect that, as
enshrined in Article 9, freedom of thought, conscience and religion is
one of the foundations of a “democratic society” within the meaning of
the Convention. It is, in its religious dimension, one of the most vital
elements that go to make up the identity of believers and their
conception of life, but it is also a precious asset for atheists,
agnostics, sceptics and the unconcerned. The pluralism indissociable
from a democratic society, which has been dearly won over the centuries,
depends on it (see Metropolitan Church of Bessarabia and Others v.
Moldova, no. 45701/99, § 114, ECHR 2001-XII).
72. While religious freedom is primarily a matter of individual
conscience, it also implies, inter alia, freedom to “manifest [one's]
religion” alone and in private or in community with others, in public
and within the circle of those whose faith one shares. Since religious
communities traditionally exist in the form of organised structures,
Article 9 must be interpreted in the light of Article 11 of the
Convention, which safeguards associative life against unjustified State
interference. Seen in that perspective, the right of believers to
freedom of religion, which includes the right to manifest one's religion
in community with others, encompasses the expectation that believers
will be allowed to associate freely, without arbitrary State
intervention. Indeed, the autonomous existence of religious communities
is indispensable for pluralism in a democratic society and is thus an
issue at the very heart of the protection which Article 9 affords. The
State's duty of neutrality and impartiality, as defined in the Court's
case-law, is incompatible with any power on the State's part to assess
the legitimacy of religious beliefs (see Metropolitan Church of
Bessarabia, cited above, §§ 118 and 123, and Hasan and Chaush v.
Bulgaria [GC], no. 30985/96, § 62, ECHR 2000-XI).
73. The Court further reiterates that the right to form an association
is an inherent part of the right set forth in Article 11. That citizens
should be able to form a legal entity in order to act collectively in a
field of mutual interest is one of the most important aspects of the
right to freedom of association, without which that right would be
deprived of any meaning. The way in which national legislation enshrines
this freedom and its practical application by the authorities reveal the
state of democracy in the country concerned. Certainly States have a
right to satisfy themselves that an association's aim and activities are
in conformity with the rules laid down in legislation, but they must do
so in a manner compatible with their obligations under the Convention
and subject to review by the Convention institutions (see Sidiropoulos
and Others v. Greece, judgment of 10 July 1998, Reports of Judgments and
Decisions 1998-IV, § 40).
74. As has been stated many times in the Court's judgments, not only is
political democracy a fundamental feature of the European public order
but the Convention was designed to promote and maintain the ideals and
values of a democratic society. Democracy, the Court has stressed, is
the only political model contemplated in the Convention and the only one
compatible with it. By virtue of the wording of the second paragraph of
Article 11, and likewise of Articles 8, 9 and 10 of the Convention, the
only necessity capable of justifying an interference with any of the
rights enshrined in those Articles is one that may claim to spring from
“democratic society” (see United Communist Party of Turkey and Others v.
Turkey, judgment of 30 January 1998, Reports of Judgments and Decisions
1998-I, §§ 43-45, and Refah Partisi (the Welfare Party) and Others v.
Turkey [GC], nos. 41340/98, 41342/98, 41343/98 and 41344/98, §§ 86-89,
ECHR 2003-II).
75. The State's power to protect its institutions and citizens from
associations that might jeopardise them must be used sparingly, as
exceptions to the rule of freedom of association are to be construed
strictly and only convincing and compelling reasons can justify
restrictions on that freedom. Any interference must correspond to a
“pressing social need”; thus, the notion “necessary” does not have the
flexibility of such expressions as “useful” or “desirable” (see Gorzelik
and Others v. Poland [GC], no. 44158/98, §§ 94-95, 17 February 2004,
with further references).
2. The applicant's status as a “victim” of the alleged violations
76. In the Government's submission, so long as the applicant had not
been dissolved and had retained its legal-entity status, there had been
no interference with its Convention rights and it could not therefore
claim to be a “victim” of any violation.
77. The Court is not convinced by the Government's contention. It
recalls that it has already examined a similar complaint by a religious
association which was denied re-registration under the new Religions Act
by the Russian authorities. It found that even in the absence of
prejudice and damage, the religious association may claim to be a
“victim” since the refusal of re-registration directly affected its
legal position (see The Moscow Branch of the Salvation Army, cited
above, §§ 64-65). It also found that the entering of the religious
association into the Unified State Register of Legal Entities did not
deprive it of its status as a “victim” so long as the domestic
authorities had not acknowledged a violation of its Convention rights
stemming from the refusal of re-registration (loc. cit., § 66). The
Court took note of the Moscow Justice Department's submission to a
domestic court that the entering of information into the Unified State
Register could not constitute “re-registration” within the meaning of
the Religions Act (loc. cit., § 67).
78. Turning to the present case, the Court notes that the situation of
the applicant is similar to that of the applicant in the case of The
Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army. The applicant was denied
re-registration required by the Religions Act and the entering of
information concerning the applicant into the Unified State Register of
Legal Entities was solely linked to the establishment of that register
and to the shifting of registration competence from one authority to
another following enactment of a new procedure for registration of legal
entities (loc. cit., § 67). The national authorities have never
acknowledged the alleged breach of the applicant's Convention rights and
have not afforded any redress. The judgments by which the refusal of
re-registration was upheld, have not been set aside and have remained in
force to date. The Nikulinskiy District Court's judgment of 30 April
2002, to which the Government referred, only concerned the proceedings
for dissolution of the applicant and was of no consequence for its claim
for re-registration.
79. Likewise, the Court finds unconvincing the Government's argument
that the applicant may not claim to be a “victim” because it has not
taken so far appropriate steps for properly applying for
re-registration. Over a course of six years from 1999 to 2005 the
applicant has filed no fewer than eleven applications for
re-registration, attempting to remedy the defects of the submitted
documents, both those that were identified by the domestic authorities
and those that were supposed to exist in the instances where the Justice
Department gave no indication as to their nature (see, for example,
paragraphs 11, 15 or 17 above). The Government did not specify by
operation of which legal provisions the applicant may still re-apply for
re-registration now that such application would obviously be belated
following the expiry of the extended time-limit on 31 December 2000. In
fact, the Justice Department invoked the expiry of that time-limit as
the ground for refusing to process the seventh to tenth applications for
re-registration by the applicant (see paragraphs 34, 38, 41 and 44
above). It follows that the applicant has been denied re-registration to
date.
80. Having regard to the above considerations, the Court finds that the
applicant may “claim” to be a “victim” of the violations complained of.
In order to ascertain whether it has actually been a victim, the merits
of its contentions have to be examined.
3. Existence of interference with the applicant's rights
81. In the light of the general principles outlined above, the ability
to establish a legal entity in order to act collectively in a field of
mutual interest is one of the most important aspects of freedom of
association, without which that right would be deprived of any meaning.
The Court has expressed the view that a refusal by the domestic
authorities to grant legal-entity status to an association of
individuals may amount to an interference with the applicants' exercise
of their right to freedom of association (see Gorzelik, cited above, §
52 et passim, and Sidiropoulos, cited above, § 31 et passim). Where the
organisation of the religious community is at issue, a refusal to
recognise it also constitutes interference with the applicants' right to
freedom of religion under Article 9 of the Convention (see Metropolitan
Church of Bessarabia, cited above, § 105). The believers' right to
freedom of religion encompasses the expectation that the community will
be allowed to function peacefully, free from arbitrary State
intervention (see Hasan and Chaush v. Bulgaria [GC], no. 30985/96, § 62,
ECHR 2000-XI).
82. The Court observes that in 1997 the respondent State enacted a new
Religions Act which required all the religious organisations that had
been previously granted legal-entity status to amend their founding
documents in conformity with the new Act and to have them
“re-registered” within a specific time-period. A failure to obtain
“re-registration” for whatever reason before the expiry of the
time-limit exposed the religious organisation to a threat of dissolution
by judicial decision (see paragraph 56 above).
83. The Court notes that before the enactment of the new Religions Act
the applicant had lawfully operated in Russia since 1994. It was unable
to obtain “re-registration” as required by the Religions Act and by
operation of law became liable for dissolution. Even though the
Constitutional Court's ruling later removed the immediate threat of
dissolution of the applicant, it is apparent that its legal capacity is
not identical to that of other religious organisations that obtained
re-registration certificates (see The Moscow Branch of The Salvation
Army, cited above, § 73). The Court observes that the absence of
re-registration was invoked by the Russian authorities as a ground for
refusing registration of amendments to the charter and for staying the
registration of a religious newspaper (see paragraphs 46 to 52 above).
84. The Court has already found in a similar case that this situation
disclosed an interference with the religious organisation's right to
freedom of association and also with its right to freedom of religion in
so far as the Religions Act restricted the ability of a religious
association without legal-entity status to exercise the full range of
religious activities (see The Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army, cited
above, § 74). These findings are applicable in the present case as well.
85. Accordingly, the Court considers that there has been interference
with the applicant's rights under Article 11 of the Convention read in
the light of Article 9 of the Convention. It must therefore determine
whether the interference satisfied the requirements of paragraph 2 of
those provisions, that is whether it was “prescribed by law”, pursued
one or more legitimate aims and was “necessary in a democratic society”
(see, among many authorities, Metropolitan Church of Bessarabia, cited
above, § 106).
4. Justification for the interference
(a) General principles applicable to the analysis of justification
86. The Court reiterates that the restriction on the rights to freedom
of religion and assembly, as contained in Articles 9 and 11 of the
Convention, is exhaustive. The exceptions to the rule of freedom of
association are to be construed strictly and only convincing and
compelling reasons can justify restrictions on that freedom. In
determining whether a necessity within the meaning of paragraph 2 of
these Convention provisions exists, the States have only a limited
margin of appreciation, which goes hand in hand with rigorous European
supervision embracing both the law and the decisions applying it,
including those given by independent courts (see Gorzelik, cited above,
§ 95; Sidiropoulos, cited above, § 40; and Stankov and the United
Macedonian Organisation Ilinden v. Bulgaria, nos. 29221/95 and 29225/95,
§ 84, ECHR 2001-IX).
87. When the Court carries out its scrutiny, its task is not to
substitute its own view for that of the relevant national authorities
but rather to review the decisions they delivered in the exercise of
their discretion. This does not mean that it has to confine itself to
ascertaining whether the respondent State exercised its discretion
reasonably, carefully and in good faith; it must look at the
interference complained of in the light of the case as a whole and
determine whether it was “proportionate to the legitimate aim pursued”
and whether the reasons adduced by the national authorities to justify
it are “relevant and sufficient”. In so doing, the Court has to satisfy
itself that the national authorities applied standards which were in
conformity with the principles embodied in the Convention and, moreover,
that they based their decisions on an acceptable assessment of the
relevant facts (see United Communist Party of Turkey, cited above, § 47,
and Partidul Comunistilor (Nepeceristi) and Ungureanu v. Romania, no.
46626/99, § 49, ECHR 2005-I (extracts)).
(b) Arguments put forward in justification of the interference
88. The Court observes that the grounds for refusing re-registration of
the applicant were not consistent throughout the time it attempted to
secure re-registration. The first application was rejected by reference
to on-going criminal proceedings against the church president and the
second one for textual discrepancies between the charter and the
Religions Act (see paragraphs 9 and 11 above). The third to sixth
applications were not processed for a failure to submit a complete set
of documents and that ground was also endorsed by the District and City
Courts (see paragraphs 15, 17, 19, and 28 above). The expiry of the
time-limit for re-registration was invoked as the ground for leaving the
seventh to tenth applications unexamined. After the courts determined
that the refusal to examine the amended charter had had no lawful basis,
the Justice Department refused the eleventh application on a new ground,
notably the failure to produce a document showing the applicant's
presence in Moscow for at least fifteen years (see paragraph 51 above).
89. The justification for the interference advanced by the Government
focussed on the findings of the District Court, as upheld on appeal by
the City Court, which determined that the applicant failed to submit
certain documents and sufficient information on its religious creed.
90. Since the existence of concurrent criminal proceedings and textual
discrepancies between the text of the Religions Act and the applicant's
charter were not identified by the domestic courts as valid grounds for
refusal of re-registration, the Court will first examine the arguments
relating to the submission of the allegedly incomplete set of documents.
91. The Court observes that the Moscow Justice Department refused to
process at least four applications for re-registration, referring to the
applicant's alleged failure to submit a complete set of documents (see
paragraphs 15, 17, 19 and 28 above). However, it did not specify why it
deemed the applications incomplete. Responding to a written inquiry by
the applicant's president, the Moscow Justice Department explicitly
declined to indicate what information or document was considered
missing, claiming that it was not competent to do so (see paragraph 15
above). The Court notes the inconsistent approach of the Moscow Justice
Department on the one hand accepting that it was competent to determine
the application incomplete but on the other hand declining its
competence to give any indication as to the nature of the allegedly
missing elements. Not only did that approach deprive the applicant of an
opportunity to remedy the supposed defects of the applications and
re-submit them, but also it ran counter to the express requirement of
the domestic law that any refusal must be reasoned. By not stating clear
reasons for rejecting the applications for re-registration submitted by
the applicant, the Moscow Justice Department acted in an arbitrary
manner. Consequently, the Court considers that that ground for refusal
was not “in accordance with the law”.
92. Examining the applicant's complaint for a second time, the District
Court advanced more specific reasons for the refusal, the first of them
being a failure to produce the original charter, registration
certificate and the document indicating the legal address (see paragraph
30 above). With regard to this ground the Court notes that the Religions
Act contained an exhaustive list of documents that were to accompany an
application for re-registration. That list did not require any specific
form in which these documents were to be submitted, whether as originals
or in copies (see paragraph 58 above). According to the Court's settled
case-law, the expression “prescribed by law” requires that the impugned
measure should have a basis in domestic law and also that the law be
formulated with sufficient precision to enable the citizen to foresee
the consequences which a given action may entail and to regulate his or
her conduct accordingly (see, as a classic authority, Sunday Times v.
the United Kingdom (no. 1), judgment of 26 April 1979, Series A no. 30,
§ 49). The requirement to submit the original documents did not follow
from the text of the Religions Act and no other regulatory documents
which might have set out such a requirement were referred to in the
domestic proceedings. It was not mentioned in the grounds for the
refusal advanced by the Moscow Justice Department or in the Presidium's
decision remitting the matter for a new examination, but appeared for
the first time in the District Court's judgment. In these circumstances,
the Court is unable to find that the domestic law was formulated with
sufficient precision enabling the applicant to foresee the adverse
consequences which the submission of copies would entail. Furthermore,
the Court considers that the requirement to enclose originals with each
application would have been excessively burdensome, or even impossible,
to fulfil in the instant case. The Justice Department was under no legal
obligation to return the documents enclosed with applications it had
refused to process and it appears that it habitually kept them in the
registration file. As there exists only a limited number of original
documents, the requirement to submit originals with each application
could have the effect of making impossible re-submission of rectified
applications for re-registration because no more originals were
available. This would have rendered the applicant's right to apply for
re-registration as merely theoretical rather than practical and
effective as required by the Convention (see Artico v. Italy, judgment
of 13 May 1980, Series A no. 37, § 33). It was pointed out by the
applicant, and not contested by the Government, that the Moscow Justice
Department had in its possession the original charter and registration
certification, as well as the document evidencing its address, which had
been included in the first application for re-registration in 1999 and
never returned to the applicant. In these circumstances, the District
Court's finding that the applicant was responsible for the failure to
produce these documents was devoid of both factual and legal basis.
93. The Nikulinskiy District Court also determined that the applicant
had not produced information on the basic tenets of creed and practices
of the religion. The Court has previously found that the refusal of
registration for a failure to present information on the fundamental
principles of a religion may be justified in the particular
circumstances of the case by the necessity to determine whether the
denomination seeking recognition presented any danger for a democratic
society (see Cârmuirea Spirituala a Musulmanilor din Republica Moldova
v. Moldova (dec.), no. 12282/02, 14 June 2005). The situation obtaining
in the present case was different. It was not disputed that the
applicant had submitted a book detailing the theological premises and
practices of Scientology. The District Court did not explain why the
book was not deemed to contain sufficient information on the basic
tenets and practices of the religion required by the Religions Act. The
Court reiterates that, if the information contained in the book was not
considered complete, it was the national courts' task to elucidate the
applicable legal requirements and thus give the applicant clear notice
how to prepare the documents (see The Moscow Branch of The Salvation
Army, cited above, § 90, and Tsonev v. Bulgaria, no. 45963/99, § 55, 13
April 2006). This had not, however, been done. Accordingly, the Court
considers that this ground for refusing re-registration has not been
made out.
94. The Court does not consider it necessary to examine whether the
refusals grounded on the expiry of the time-limit for re-registration
were justified because in the subsequent proceedings the domestic courts
acknowledged that the Moscow Justice Department's decision not to
process an application for registration of the amended charter on that
ground was unlawful (see paragraphs 47 and 48 above). In any event, as
the Court has found above, the applicant's failure to secure
re-registration within the established time-limit was a direct
consequence of arbitrary rejection of its earlier applications by the
Moscow Justice Department.
95. Finally, as regards the rejection of the most recent, eleventh
application on the ground that the document showing fifteen-year
presence in Moscow had not been produced (see paragraph 51 above), the
Court notes that this requirement had no lawful basis. The
Constitutional Court had determined already in 2002 that no such
document should be required from organisations which had existed before
the entry into force of the Religions Act in 1997 (see paragraph 61
above). The applicant had been registered as a religious organisation
since 1994 and fell into that category.
96. It follows that the grounds invoked by the domestic authorities for
refusing re-registration of the applicant had no lawful basis. A further
consideration relevant for the Court's assessment of the proportionality
of the interference is that by the time the re-registration requirement
was introduced, the applicant had lawfully existed and operated in
Moscow as an independent religious community for three years. It has not
been submitted that the community as a whole or its individual members
had been in breach of any domestic law or regulation governing their
associative life and religious activities. In these circumstances, the
Court considers that the reasons for refusing re-registration should
have been particularly weighty and compelling (see The Moscow Branch of
The Salvation Army, cited above, § 96, and the case-law cited in
paragraph 86 above). In the present case no such reasons have been put
forward by the domestic authorities.
97. In view of the Court's finding above that the reasons invoked by
the Moscow Justice Department and endorsed by the Moscow courts to deny
re-registration of the applicant branch had no legal basis, it can be
inferred that, in denying registration to the Church of Scientology of
Moscow, the Moscow authorities did not act in good faith and neglected
their duty of neutrality and impartiality vis-à-vis the applicant's
religious community (see The Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army, cited
above, § 97).
98. In the light of the foregoing, the Court considers that the
interference with the applicant's right to freedom of religion and
association was not justified. There has therefore been a violation of
Article 11 of the Convention read in the light of Article 9.
II. ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLE 14 OF THE CONVENTION, READ IN
CONJUNCTION WITH ARTICLES 9, 10 AND 11
99. The applicant further complained under Article 14 of the
Convention, read in conjunction with Articles 9, 10 and 11, that it had
been discriminated against on account of its position as a religious
minority in Russia. Article 14 reads as follows:
“The enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in [the] Convention
shall be secured without discrimination on any ground such as sex, race,
colour, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or
social origin, association with a national minority, property, birth or
other status.”
100. The Court reiterates that Article 14 has no independent existence,
but plays an important role by complementing the other provisions of the
Convention and the Protocols, since it protects individuals placed in
similar situations from any discrimination in the enjoyment of the
rights set forth in those other provisions. Where a substantive Article
of the Convention or its Protocols has been invoked both on its own and
together with Article 14 and a separate breach has been found of the
substantive Article, it is not generally necessary for the Court to
consider the case under Article 14 also, though the position is
otherwise if a clear inequality of treatment in the enjoyment of the
right in question is a fundamental aspect of the case (see Chassagnou
and Others v. France [GC], nos. 25088/94, 28331/95 and 28443/95, § 89,
ECHR 1999-III, and Dudgeon v. the United Kingdom, judgment of 22 October
1981, Series A no. 45, § 67).
101. In the circumstances of the present case the Court considers that
the inequality of treatment, of which the applicant claimed to be a
victim, has been sufficiently taken into account in the above assessment
that led to the finding of a violation of substantive Convention
provisions (see, in particular, paragraph 97 above). It follows that
there is no cause for a separate examination of the same facts from the
standpoint of Article 14 of the Convention (see Metropolitan Church of
Bessarabia, § 134, and Sidiropoulos, § 52, both cited above).
III. APPLICATION OF ARTICLE 41 OF THE CONVENTION
102. Article 41 of the Convention provides:
“If the Court finds that there has been a violation of the Convention or
the Protocols thereto, and if the internal law of the High Contracting
Party concerned allows only partial reparation to be made, the Court
shall, if necessary, afford just satisfaction to the injured party.”
A. Damage
103. The applicant claimed a global amount of 20,000 euros (“EUR”) in
respect of pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage incurred through on-going
uncertainty as to the applicant's legal status, serious disruption of
its management and activities, diversion of resources to administrative
matters concerning re-registration and litigation. They also requested
the Court to hold that the respondent State was to secure
re-registration of the applicant as a religious organisation and issue
the registration certificate.
104. The Government claimed that the claim was excessive and
unreasonable. In their view, lawful litigation could not have caused any
damage.
105. The Court considers that the violation it has found must have
caused the applicant non-pecuniary damage for which it awards, on an
equitable basis, EUR 10,000, plus any tax that may be chargeable. It
rejects the remainder of the applicant's claim for non-pecuniary damage.
106. As regards the applicant's request for injunctive relief in
respect of the re-registration of the applicant, the Court is not
empowered under the Convention to grant exemptions or declarations of
the kind sought by the applicant, for its judgments are essentially
declaratory in nature. In general, it is primarily for the State
concerned to choose the means to be used in its domestic legal order in
order to discharge its legal obligation under Article 46 of the
Convention (see Shofman v. Russia, no. 74826/01, § 53, 24 November 2005,
with further references). By finding a violation of Article 11 read in
the light of Article 9 in the present case, the Court has established
the Government's obligation to take appropriate measures to remedy the
applicant's individual situation (see Fadeyeva v. Russia, no. 55723/00,
§ 142, ECHR 2005-...). Whether such measures would involve granting
re-registration to the applicant, removing the requirement to obtain
re-registration from the Religions Act, re-opening of the domestic
proceedings or a combination of these and other measures, is a decision
that falls to the respondent State. The Court, however, emphasises that
any measures adopted must be compatible with the conclusions set out in
the Court's judgment (see Assanidze v. Georgia [GC], no. 71503/01, §
202, ECHR 2004-II, with further references).
B. Costs and expenses
107. Relying on documentary evidence, the applicant claimed EUR 142.92
in court fees and EUR 11,653.93 in legal fees. It also claimed an
additional amount of EUR 20,000 for outstanding legal fees due under the
contract with respect to litigation before the domestic courts and the
Strasbourg proceedings.
108. The Government submitted that only real and necessary expenses
should be reimbursed.
109. The Court accepts that the applicant incurred costs and expenses
in connection with the repeated attempts to secure re-registration and
domestic and Strasbourg proceedings. The applicant's expenses are
supported with relevant materials. It considers, however, that the
amount claimed in respect of outstanding legal fees is excessive and a
certain reduction must be applied. Having regard to the elements in its
possession, the Court awards the applicant EUR 15,000 in respect of
costs and expenses, plus any tax that may be chargeable on that amount.
C. Default interest
110. The Court considers it appropriate that the default interest
should be based on the marginal lending rate of the European Central
Bank, to which should be added three percentage points.
FOR THESE REASONS, THE COURT UNANIMOUSLY
1. Holds that the applicant may claim to be a “victim” for the purposes
of Article 34 of the Convention;

2. Holds that there has been a violation of Article 11 of the
Convention read in the light of Article 9;

3. Holds that no separate examination of the same issues under Article
14 of the Convention is required;

4. Holds
(a) that the respondent State is to pay the applicant, within three
months from the date on which the judgment becomes final in accordance
with Article 44 § 2 of the Convention, the following amounts, to be
converted into Russian roubles at the rate applicable at the date of the
settlement,
(i) EUR 10,000 (ten thousand euros) in respect of non-pecuniary damage;
(ii) EUR 15,000 (fifteen thousand euros) in respect of costs and
expenses;
(iii) any tax that may be chargeable on the above amounts;
(b) that from the expiry of the above-mentioned three months until
settlement simple interest shall be payable on the above amounts at a
rate equal to the marginal lending rate of the European Central Bank
during the default period plus three percentage points;

5. Dismisses the remainder of the applicant's claim for just
satisfaction.
Done in English, and notified in writing on 5 April 2007, pursuant to
Rule 77 §§ 2 and 3 of the Rules of Court.
Søren Nielsen
Christos Rozakis
Registrar
President

[Feisty]

"antisectes" <roger....@chello.fr> wrote in message
news:4614fbb8$0$3465$a3f2...@nnrp1.numericable.fr...

The beginning of this new law should have saved the wasted litigous inundation that
followed for years:

> 7. On 1 October 1997 a new Law on Freedom of Conscience and Religious Associations
> ("the Religions Act") entered into force. It required all religious associations that
> had previously been granted legal-entity status to bring their articles of association
> into conformity with the Act and obtain re-registration from the competent Justice
> Department.

"Scientology] is nothing in reality but a vast enterprise to extract the maximum amount of
money from its adepts by pseudo scientific theories... and to exercise a kind of blackmail
against persons who do not wish to continue with their sect.... The organization clearly
is schizophrenic and paranoid, and this bizarre combination seems to be a reflection of
its founder, L.Ron Hubbard."

- Hon. Paul G. Breckenridge Jr.
Decision in Scientology v. Armstrong
[Affirmed on Appeal]

Justice Latey, ruling in the High Court of London:

"Scientology is both immoral and socially obnoxious...It is corrupt sinister and
dangerous. It is corrupt because it is based on lies and deceit and has its real objective
money and power for Mr. Hubbard... It is sinister because it indulges in infamous
practices both to its adherents who do not toe the line unquestionably and to those who
criticize it or oppose it. It is dangerous because it is out to capture people and to
indoctrinate and brainwash them so they become the unquestioning captives and tools of the
cult, withdrawn from ordinary thought, living, and relationships with others."

Maureen

>
>

[nexibello]

On Apr 5, 5:39 pm, "Feisty" <s...@skytoday.com> wrote:
> "antisectes" <roger.gon...@chello.fr> wrote in message

For individuals or companies who try to or are doing business in
Russia this text brings up many painful (and in a kafkaesque way
amusing) memories about former or ongoing battles with Russian
bureaucracy (correct spelling ought to be bureau-crazy...) .... not
that those "individuals or companies" would or should feel sorry in
ANY way for Scientology..... Russian citizens may be in need of a lot
of things but certainly not of an organization like Scientology whose
only is to benefit from their misery and make their lives even more
miserable.

On the other hand ... I'm absolutely convinced that the Russian tax
authorities will find a perfectly legal way to get back those EUR
30,000 in no time - their fantasy and obstinacy are extraordinary.

~{}{}{}].)
nexibello

[nexibello]

that should have read "whose only AIM is to benefit"

[Gerry Armstrong]

On Thu, 5 Apr 2007 15:37:30 +0200, "antisectes"
<roger....@chello.fr> wrote:

>FIRST SECTION
>
>CASE OF CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY MOSCOW v. RUSSIA

Wow! There's a war Scientology better not treat like a skirmish.

>
>(Application no. 18147/02)
>
>JUDGMENT
>
>STRASBOURG
>
>5 April 2007
>
>
>This judgment will become final in the circumstances set out in Article
>44 § 2 of the Convention. It may be subject to editorial revision.

[Quote]

Article 44 - Final judgments

1.The judgment of the Grand Chamber shall be final.
2.The judgment of a Chamber shall become final

a when the parties declare that they will not request that the case be
referred to the Grand Chamber; or

b three months after the date of the judgment, if reference of the
case to the Grand Chamber has not been requested; or

c when the panel of the Grand Chamber rejects the request to refer
under Article 43.

3.The final judgment shall be published.

[End Quote]
http://www.echr.coe.int/NR/rdonlyres/D5CC24A7-DC13-4318-B457-5C9014916D7A/0/EnglishAnglais.pdf

>
>
>In the case of Church of Scientology Moscow v. Russia,
>The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting as a Chamber

Okay, then this case can, one would imagine, within three months be
referred to the Grand Chamber. This is an opportunity.

>composed of:
> Mr C.L. Rozakis, President,
> Mr L. Loucaides,
> Mrs N. Vajic,
> Mr A. Kovler,
> Mrs E. Steiner,
> Mr K. Hajiyev,
> Mr D. Spielmann, judges,
>and Mr S. Nielsen, Section Registrar,
>Having deliberated in private on 15 March 2007,
>Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:
>PROCEDURE
>1. The case originated in an application (no. 18147/02) against the
>Russian Federation lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the
>Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms
>(“the Convention”) by the Church of Scientology of the city of Moscow
>(“the applicant”), on 24 April 2002.

I wonder how many applications Scientology filed before the Court
accepted this one? The organization will do a lot to get into the
news. I wonder too about all the data gathered on these judges, all
the connections into them, and all the ops run on them.

>2. The applicant was represented before the Court by Mr P. Hodkin, a
>lawyer practising in East Grinstead, the United Kingdom, and Ms G.
>Krylova and Mr M. Kuzmichev, lawyers practising in Moscow. The Russian
>Government (“the Government”) were represented by Mr P. Laptev,
>Representative of the Russian Federation at the European Court of Human
>Rights.

I guess Mr. Laptev is the go to guy.

Oops, that would be Veronika Milinchuk.
http://www.kommersant.com/p752062/r_1/Court_Human_Rights_Ministry_Justice/

Sounds like an Edmonton girl.

>3. The applicant complained, in particular, about the domestic
>authorities' refusal of its application for re-registration as a legal
>entity.
>4. By a decision of 28 October 2004, the Court declared the application
>partly admissible.

Wow, a year and a half or so since the application was accepted.

>5. The applicant and the Government each filed observations on the
>merits (Rule 59 § 1).

Ah, they call them "observations."

>THE FACTS
>I. THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE CASE
>A. Initial attempts to secure re-registration of the applicant
>6. On 25 January 1994 the applicant was officially registered as a
>religious association having legal-entity status under the RSFSR
>Religions Act of 25 October 1990.
>7. On 1 October 1997 a new Law on Freedom of Conscience and Religious
>Associations (“the Religions Act”) entered into force. It required all
>religious associations that had previously been granted legal-entity
>status to bring their articles of association into conformity with the
>Act and obtain re-registration from the competent Justice Department.

That would make sense. It's how a country would presumably shift its
religious associations onto the new law, which obviously recognizes
these basic freedoms -- conscience and association.

>8. On 11 August 1998 the applicant submitted to the Moscow Justice
>Department an application for re-registration, together with the
>documents required by law.

That second fact has not been established as far as I can see.

>9. On 1 June 1999 the Moscow Justice Department refused re-registration
>of the applicant on the ground that its purpose and activities
>contradicted the requirements of the Religions Act and violated the
>Criminal Code as there was an on-going criminal investigation against
>the then president of the applicant.

Okay there were two grounds: Scientology's purpose and activities
contradicted the requirements of the Religions Act; and the criminal
case, whatever that was.

If the Religions Act required that an organization uphold the basic
human rights that the Act identified and upheld, then Scientology's
purpose and activities constantly and overwhelmingly contradict the
Act's requirements.

Consequently, so far I would say that the Moscow Justice Court made a
good decision, and provided ample grounds. Scientology's leaders;
i.e., David Miscavige and his enforcement arm, know beyond any
rational argument that the organization they control is in constant,
willful violation of people's basic human rights.

The most astonishing example is the Scientology v. Armstrong case,
which flows from a contract that compels every Scientology church,
group or affiliated entity, and all of their directors, officers,
employees, volunteers, agents, and even attorneys (including clearly
Peter Hodkin, Galina Krylova and M. Kuzmichev mentioned above), to
violate basic human rights that the Convention articulates and
defends.
http://www.gerryarmstrong.org/50grand/legal/index.html

> The applicant indicated that the
>investigation had been subsequently closed in the absence of indications
>of a criminal offence.

That would make sense, except for Scientologists' universal human
rights violations. Plus fraud and extortion, and generally
unconscionable behavior. Scientology is so fraudulent and extortive
that sometimes it's impossible to see the trees for the forest.

>10. On 29 December 1999 the applicant submitted a second application
>for re-registration.
>11. On 28 January 2000 the deputy head of the Moscow Justice Department
>informed the applicant that the second application had been refused. He
>wrote that the applicant had adopted a “new version of the Charter”,
>rather than “amendments to the Charter”, and had indicated that by the
>charter, the applicant “may have”, instead of “shall be entitled to
> have”, attached representative offices of foreign religious
>organisations. He also claimed that there had been other (unspecified)
>violations of Russian laws.

Ah, maybe the MJD's deputy head is on to Scientology's purpose and
activities that contradict the requirements of the Religions Act.

>12. On 10 February 2000 the then president of the applicant sent a
>letter to the Moscow Justice Department inviting them to indicate
>specific violations. He relied on the requirement in section 12.2 of the
>Religions Act, pursuant to which the grounds for a refusal were to be
>set out explicitly.

One would think that the statement that Scientology's "purpose and
activities contradicted the requirements of the Religions Act" would
be explicit enough.

But it must be understood that a condition or "beingness" that
Scientologists and their agents commonly adopt to further their
purposes is pretended ignorance. Here the Scientologists pretend that
they don't know what something that is very clear means in order to
make their not being told what it means seem of great importance.

Scientologists know very well that they and their organization are in
willful violation of people's basic human rights, and consequently in
violation of the Religions Act and the Convention. As mentioned above,
the Scientology v. Armstrong case demonstrates that Scientologists and
their agents and attorneys are organized and contracted to violate
basic human rights on a massive scale in every Scientology church or
related entity around the world.

Now that they've asked, however, and in fact because Scientology has
taken this matter to Strasbourg, it is possible to be very specific in
what the organization's violations of the Religions Act and the
Convention are.

Wow. You'd think that if there were any OTs in Scientology they would
have cognited back at paragraph 15 they were getting the proverbial
Russian Runaround.

As everyone knows, I'm a serious guy, and this is a serious ruling and
issue. But doesn't the story so far smack of Get Smart?

>20. On 31 December 2000 the time-limit for re-registration of religious
>organisations expired.

Well, they can't say they didn't have an equal opportunity.

>B. Litigation with the Justice Department

>21. The president and co-founder of the applicant brought a complaint
>before the Nikulinskiy District Court of Moscow against the Moscow
>Justice Department's refusal to re-register the applicant.

Date's missing. If someone can date this it would be helpful.

>22. On 8 December 2000 the Nikulinskiy District Court of Moscow gave
>judgment, finding that the Justice Department's decision of 28 January
>2000 had not had any basis in law. It established that the wordings used
>in the applicant's charter were in fact identical to those contained in
>the Religions Act and held that religious associations should not “be
>required to reproduce the text of the law verbatim in their charter”.
>The court stressed that the Justice Department could have suggested an
>editorial revision of the charter without refusing the application as a
>whole.

I think the Russian Runaround has run into substance. But suggesting
an editorial version for Scientology substantive submission; i.e., its
"purpose and activities," probably is not the Justice Department's
function. That would come in a judgment in a court proceeding that
Scientology would initiate following the legal evaluation of the
submitted documents and the refusal to grant re-registration.

>23. The District Court further held that the decision of 29 June 2000
>had not been lawful, either. It established that all the documents
>required by the Religions Act had been appended to the application with
>the exception of a document confirming the existence of the religious
>group in the given territory for no less than fifteen years. However,
>that document was not necessary because, in accordance with the ruling
>of the Constitutional Court, religious organisations established before
>the adoption of the Religions Act were not required to confirm their
>fifteen-year existence.
>24. The District Court concluded that the Moscow Justice Department had
>been “in essence, using subterfuges to avoid re-registration [of the
>applicant]”.

There we are. That's what the Russian Runaround is: using subterfuges
to avoid doing something or other. In connection with Scientology, the
U.S. Justice Department certainly operates this way. In other
departments too. Probably there's a little Russian Runaround in every
government's departments. And its opposite too, the Russian Rubdown or
Rubledown, which keeps bureaucracies working.

>It pointed out that such avoidance or refusals had violated
>the rights of the plaintiffs and their fellow believers guaranteed by
>Article 29 and 30 of the Russian Constitution because the parishioners
>whose association had no legal-entity status would not be able to rent
>premises for religious ceremonies and worship, to receive and
>disseminate religious literature, to have bank accounts, etc.

Yes, you pretty well have to give them a status, address, and bank
account to give them a face and keep them above ground as much as
possible.

>The
>District Court also held that the refusal had been inconsistent with
>international standards of law, Articles 9 and 11 of the Convention and
>Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

[Quote]

Article 9 – Freedom of thought, conscience and religion

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion;
this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and
freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or
private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching,
practice and observance.

Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs shall be subject only to
such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a
democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the
protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of
the rights and freedoms of others.

[...]

Article 11 – Freedom of assembly and association

Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and to freedom
of association with others, including the right to form and to join
trade unions for the protection of his interests.

No restrictions shall be placed on the exercise of these rights other
than such as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic
society in the interests of national security or public safety, for
the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or
morals or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.

This article shall not prevent the imposition of lawful restrictions
on the exercise of these rights by members of the armed forces, of the
police or of the administration of the State.

[End Quote]
http://conventions.coe.int/Treaty/en/Treaties/Html/005.htm

[Quote]

Article 18
1. Everyone shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and
religion. This right shall include freedom to have or to adopt a
religion or belief of his choice, and freedom, either individually or

in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his

religion or belief in worship, observance, practice and teaching.
2. No one shall be subject to coercion which would impair his freedom
to have or to adopt a religion or belief of his choice.

3. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs may be subject only
to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary to
protect public safety, order, health, or morals or the fundamental

rights and freedoms of others.

4. The States Parties to the present Covenant undertake to have
respect for the liberty of parents and, when applicable, legal
guardians to ensure the religious and moral education of their
children in conformity with their own convictions.

[End Quote]
http://www.ohchr.org/english/law/ccpr.htm

The Convention's 10th Article is also worth posting, since Scientology
and Scientologists seek to suppress and destroy this fundamental right
as well.

[Quote]

Article 10 – Freedom of expression

Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall
include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information
and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of
frontiers. This article shall not prevent States from requiring the
licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and
responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions,
restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary
in a democratic society, in the interests of national security,
territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder
or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection
of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure
of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the
authority and impartiality of the judiciary.

[End Quote]

>The District Court also referred to Article 7 of the United Nations
>Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and of
>Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief and held that “the refusal to
>grant legal-entity status to a religious entity imposes a practical
>restriction on the right of each person to profess his/her religion in
>community with others”.

I think there is no basis for that to be an equation or law. But okay,
for a starting point.

>The District Court concluded as follows:
>“Hence, the justice authorities' avoidance of re-registration of the
>Church of Scientology of Moscow under far-fetched pretexts contradicts
>the above mentioned laws of the Russian Federation and the international
>law.”

Yes, the Russian Runaround could be a batch of far-fetched pretexts.

>The District Court ordered the Moscow Justice Department to re-register
>the applicant.

One would think that would have been the end of it.

>25. The Justice Department did not appeal against the judgment and it
>became binding and enforceable on 19 December 2000. However, the Moscow
>Justice Department refused to comply with it.

Wow.

>26. On 27 December 2000 the president of the applicant obtained a writ
>of execution.

Russia meets the Scientology litigation machine. There go Finland's
forests.

>27. On 4 January 2001 the applicant submitted its sixth application
>along with the writ of execution mandating re-registration.

DM will be out of his gourd product officering the Eastern Front. He's
right on Moscow's doorstep. That's not worked out so well over the
years for other little dictators.

>28. On 2 February 2001 the Justice Department refused to process the
>application, repeating that an incomplete set of documents had been
>submitted. No clarification as to the nature of the allegedly missing
>document(s) was given.
>29. On an unspecified date the Moscow Justice Department asked the
>Moscow City prosecutor to lodge an application for supervisory review
>which he did.

Ah, sleeping bear awakes.

>The prosecutor's application was granted by the Presidium
>of the Moscow City Court.

??????? ????????????? ?????!

That's "Let's get ready to rumble!" via Google Translator.

> On 29 March 2001 the Presidium quashed the
>judgment of 8 December 2000 by way of supervisory review. In doing so,
>it relied on the following grounds. Concerning the lawfulness of the
>decision of 28 January 2000, the Presidium criticised the District Court
>for the failure to verify the compliance of the amendments to the
>charter submitted for re-registration on 29 December 1999 with the law.

Exactly, I think.

I'd have to see the paperwork.

>As to the refusal of 29 June 2000, the Presidium opined that the book
>Scientology: The Theology and Practice of a Contemporary Religion
>(Russian edition) did not provide sufficient information on “the basic
>tenets of creed and practices of the religion” as required by section
>11.5 of the Religions Act and that the set of documents was therefore
>incomplete.

That's actually very astute. I take back all my Russian Runaround
comments.

The fact is that no Scientology-published book can conceivably contain
"the basic tenets of creed and practices of the religion” and
Scientology would never submit documents demonstrating what its basic
tenets of creed and practices are. The set of documents Scientology
submits cannot but be incomplete.

The book Scientology: The Theology and Practice of a Contemporary
Religion is a public relations product that argues that Scientology is
a religion. Consequently Scientology would argue its basic tenets of
creed and practices are religious. But the book is *not* what those
basic tenets of creed and practices of the religion are.

The book does happen to contain what Scientology calls it "Creed." As
the Scientology v. Armstrong war has shown for 20 years, however, this
public "creed" is a fraud. The Scientologists, virtually universally,
are *contracted* to violate the "creed" printed in this book. They are
*contracted* to suppress and destroy basic human rights, not just for
me, but through my successful persecution and through threat, to
suppress and destroy the basic human rights of virtually every person
on the planet, anyone who would act in concert with me.

> The Presidium remitted the matter for a new examination by
>the District Court.
>30. On 7 August 2001 the Nikulinskiy District Court gave a new
>judgment. The District Court ruled in favour of the Moscow Justice
>Department and dismissed the complaint about the refusal to re-register
>the applicant. It found that the applicant had not complied with section
>11 of the Religions Act in that (i) the application for re-registration
>only included copies, rather than originals, of the charter and
>registration certificate; (ii) the book submitted by the applicant did
>not qualify to be the “information on the basic tenets of creed and
>practices of the religion”, and (iii) the document indicating the legal
>address of the applicant was missing.

I'll bet too the Scientologists also submitted nothing about Xenu, or
the BTs and Clusters, the hydrogen bombs, the religious implants. For
that matter, the Scientologists undoubtedly withheld Hubbard's black
magic past; their cult's espionage nature and activities; their
leader's sociopathy; their fraud; their extortion; their fair game
philosophy, policy and practice; their "disconnection" conditions;
their "Suppressive Person" doctrine.

>31. Before the court the plaintiffs unsuccessfully argued that the
>Moscow Justice Department had had in its possession the original charter
>and registration certificate, as well as the applicant's legal address,
>as these documents had been included in the first application for
>re-registration and the Moscow Justice Department had never returned
>them. The District Court concluded, nevertheless, that “the fact that
>some documents were [physically] in the building of the Department did
>not relieve the applicant of the obligation to submit a complete set of
>documents for registration”. It affirmed that “all required documents
>were to be submitted simultaneously”.

Scientology simply did *not* submit all the required documents. I
could prepare a list of documents for the Russian authorities that
Scientology could submit and would satisfactorily constitute

information on the basic tenets of creed and practices of the
religion.

>32. On 26 October 2001 the Moscow City Court upheld the judgment on

>appeal, endorsing the District Court's reasoning.

Makes sense.

>33. On 16 January 2002 the applicant submitted a seventh application
>for re-registration. In observance with the domestic courts' judgments
>the application included (i) the original charter and registration
>certificate; (ii) “information about the basic tenets of creed and
>practices” in the form of a four-page document instead of a book; and
>(iii) a new document confirming the legal address.

This four-page document is important. I have the © 1998 Church of
Scientology International English edition of the book Scientology: The
Theology and Practice of a Contemporary Religion; but these four pages
are something perhaps much of the world has not seen.

It is very unlikely it is information about the basic tenets of creed
and practices of the religion, and certainly, being only four pages,
unacceptable.

Scientologists are required to lie about what the actual basic tenets
of the actual creed and actual practices of the religion actually are.

>34. On 23 January 2002 a new deputy head of the Moscow Justice
>Department refused to process the application on the ground that the
>time-limit for re-registration of religious organisation had expired and
>that a civil action for the applicant's dissolution (see below) was
>pending.
>35. On 30 April 2002 the Nikulinskiy District Court refused the Justice
>Department's civil action for dissolution of the applicant, referring to
>the Constitutional Court's decision of 7 February 2002 in the case of
>The Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army, according to which a religious
>organisation could only be dissolved by a judicial decision if it was
>duly established that it had ceased its activity or had engaged in
>unlawful activities

Which Scientology has done and is doing . The Scientology v. Armstrong
case also demonstrates that Scientology, every org, group or
affiliated entity, all their employees, volunteers, agents and even
attorneys, and virtually every Scientologist, comprise a criminal
conspiracy against rights guaranteed to me, and to virtually every
Russian, and every wog of every nation.

>(for a detailed description of the decision, see The
>Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army v. Russia, no. 72881/01, §§ 23-24,
>ECHR 2006-...). Since the applicant had on-going financial and economic
>activities, maintained balance sheets and staged events in municipal
>districts of Moscow, and had not commited any wrongful acts, the action
>for its dissolution was dismissed. On 18 July 2002 the Moscow City Court
>upheld that judgment on appeal.

That makes sense. The Sally Ann don't have a "Suppressive Person"
doctrine, aren't suppressing or destroying basic human rights en bloc,
or necessarily work for a foreign intelligence organization.

>D. Further attempts to secure re-registration
>36. On 1 July 2002 the system for State registration of legal entities
>was reformed. A new Unified State Register of Legal Entities was
>established and the competence to make entries was delegated to the
>Ministry for Taxes and Duties (Tax Ministry). However, in respect of
>religious organisations a special procedure was retained, under which
>the regional departments of the Ministry of Justice would still make the
>decision of whether to register a religious organisation, whilst formal
>processing of the approved application would pass to the Tax Ministry.
>All existing legal entities were required to provide to local tax
>authorities certain updated information about themselves by 31 December
>2002.
>37. On 11 July 2002 the applicant submitted its eighth application for
>re-registration to the Moscow Justice Department, under the new
>procedure.
>38. On 9 August 2002 the Justice Department refused to process the
>application, repeating that re-registration was no longer possible due
>to the expiry of the time-limit.

Ah, that could be a problem. Not an altogether bad move, because it
indicates a sense of humor, and still gave the Scientologists the
opportunity to withdraw their application and go elsewhere with some
honor. Probably not the case now that the cult has taken the issue to
the ECHR.

>39. On 24 September 2002, after the Moscow City Court upheld the
>judgment refusing dissolution of the applicant, the applicant submitted
>a ninth application for re-registration. On the same day it also
>submitted the updated information required under the new procedure, to
>the local registering tax authority, Moscow Tax Inspectorate no. 39.

Well that remains to be seen. Let's see what the cult submitted. If
the "updated information required" included the applicant's basic
tenets of creed and practices, it is, I believe, impossible that
Scientology submitted such information. If Scientology ever did submit
information about its basic tenets of creed and practices, any civil
authority could deny it registration as a religion because its basic
tenets of creed and practices would show it to be a criminal
conspiracy against rights, as well as a scam, and a totalitarian
psychocult at war with and persecuting good citizens.

The cult is pursuing this game here on multiple channels. DM must be
in shoat heaven.

>40. On 2 October 2002 the head of the Moscow Justice Department,
>responded to the applicant's letter of 2 September 2002 in the following
>terms:
>“...a situation exits when, on one hand, the action of the [Moscow
>Justice Department] seeking dissolution of your religious organisation
>has been refused, and, on the other hand, the very same court has upheld
>as lawful our decisions to leave the applications and documents for
>re-registration of this organisation unexamined, whereas the time-limit
>for re-registration established by law has expired.”

Catch-Twenty-Twosky.

>41. On 23 October 2002 the Justice Department refused to process the
>ninth application, referring to the above letter from the department
>head and stating, as before, that the time-limit had passed.

But instead of the Sea Organs going away, I'll bet they come back.

>42. On 29 October 2002 Moscow Tax Inspectorate no. 39 entered the
>applicant on the Unified State Register of Legal Entities and issued the
>registration certificate.

Holy Crowley. But there was perhaps a fee involved. Nobody wants to
send back a fee.

>43. On 24 December 2002 the applicant submitted a tenth application for
>re-registration, attaching the registration certificate.

See, they're back. Well it's only Christmas Eve for the
Scientologists, not for the Russian Justice Department officials.

>44. On 24 January 2003 the Justice Department left the tenth
>application unexamined, repeating once again that the time-limit had
>expired.

What difficulties and frightful opposition the Scientologists have to
face in their fight for the right to suppress and destroy human
rights. I would imagine they'll now claim that they have the ECHR's
stamp of approval on their activities -- their creed and practices.
Yes, here it is: http://www.theta.com/

[Quote]

In a landmark decision today, the European Court of Human Rights found
in favor of the Scientology religion, upholding the religious freedom
of Scientologists throughout the forty-six nations that comprise the
Council of Europe.

In a unanimous landmark decision today, the European Court of Human
Rights (First Section) found in favor of the Scientology religion,
upholding the religious freedom of Scientologists throughout the
forty-six nations that comprise the Council of Europe, in a
precedent-setting ruling that will help guarantee these rights for
people of all faiths.

[End Quote]

The "religious freedom" that Scientologists claim includes the right
to do evil to all God's children, wogs and Scientologists. It
includes the right to Fair Game the wogs who object to the evil, or
who criticize "technology" and organization that implants the desire
to do that evil, and to black PR these wogs as "anti-religious
extremists" and "Suppressive Persons."

>E. Further litigation with the Justice Department
>45. On 24 April 2003 the applicant lodged a complaint against the
>Justice Department's persistent refusal to re-register the applicant
>under the Religions Act. It argued, in particular, that the actions of
>the Justice Department constituted a breach of the rights to freedom of
>religion and association of the applicant and its members. It submitted
>a copy of the registration certificate of 29 October 2002 and relied on
>the Constitutional Court's decision of 7 February 2002.

The Salvation Army v. Russia case.

>46. On 1 September 2003 the Presnenskiy District Court of Moscow
>dismissed the complaint, holding that the Religions Act did not provide
>for a possibility to re-register religious organisations that had missed
>the time-limit for re-registration.

Oops.

>47. On 22 January 2004 the Moscow City Court quashed the judgment of 1
>September 2003 and remitted the case. It held as follows:
>“...failure to re-register within the established time-limit cannot in
>itself serve as a basis... for refusal to register amendments to the
>charter... of a religious organisation upon expiry of the established
>time-limit...
>Refusal of registration of amendments to the founding documents of a
>religious organisation restricts the rights of the organisation, and, as
>a consequence, those of its members, to determine independently the
>legal conditions of its existence and functioning.”

I haven't understood this section very clearly. "Founding documents"
could be what Scientology submitted, including either its book or its
four pages; or it could be what Scientology had submitted to obtain
its 1994 registration. In any event, back to the the Presnenskiy
District Court.

>48. On 3 November 2004 the Presnenskiy District Court granted the
>applicant's complaint against the Justice Department. It found that the
>Religions Act could not be interpreted as restricting a religious
>organisation's ability to amend its founding documents after the expiry
>of the time-limit set for re-registration.

That makes sense. The application was in the system. Fair enough. And
again, showing some good humor.

>The Justice Department's
>decision not to process the application for registration of the amended
>charter was therefore unlawful. The District Court ordered the Justice
>Department to re-register the applicant by way of registering its
>charter as amended in 2002.

Well, there I think it must have gone wrong. It should have ordered an
investigation to see, inter alia, what the applicant's actual tenets
of the actual creed and actual practices of the religion actually are.

>49. On 4 February 2005 the Moscow City Court upheld the interpretation
>of the Religions Act given by the District Court. However, it found that
>the Justice Department was wrongly ordered to register the amended
>charter without reviewing its compliance with the law.

That makes sense.

>The City Court
>amended the operative part of the judgment and ordered the Justice
>Department to examine the applicant's application for registration in
>accordance with the established procedure.

I'm not sure I've understood this correctly, but fair enough. I can't
know what the established procedure is.

>50. On 31 May 2005 the applicant re-submitted its application for
>registration to the Moscow Registration Department, that is, the legal
>successor of the Moscow Justice Department in matters of registration of
>religious organisations following a reform of the justice system.

Okay.

>51. On 27 June 2005 the Moscow Registration Department informed the
>applicant that its application would not be processed because it had not
>submitted a document confirming its presence in Moscow for at least
>fifteen years.

Oh oh. Russian Runaround Redux.

>F. Concurrent developments

Wow. Mucha drama. The little dictator has Russia in his cross hairs.

>52. On 2 September 2003 the Ministry for the Press, Tele/Radio
>Communications and Mass Communication rejected the applicant's
>application for registration of its newspaper Religion, Law and Freedom.
>The decision cited no legal grounds for the refusal and read, in its
>entirety, as follows:
>“We report, that after the court proceedings between [the applicant] and
>[the Moscow Justice Department] have completed (that is, after the
>judgment has entered into legal force), this organisation may apply
>again for registration of the newspaper Religion, Law and Freedom.”

Makes sense.

>II. RELEVANT DOMESTIC LAW AND PRACTICE
>A. Constitution of the Russian Federation
>53. Article 29 guarantees freedom of religion, including the right to
>profess either alone or in community with others any religion or to
>profess no religion at all, to freely choose, have and share religious
>and other beliefs and manifest them in practice.

Sounds eminently fair.

>54. Article 30 provides that everyone shall have the right to freedom
>of association.

Sure. As far as I know, only the Scientologists have been implanted in
this age with the requisite hubris to attempt to suppress freedom of
association; and especially to call such suppression of freedom of
association "religious liberty."

>B. The Religions Act
>55. On 1 October 1997 the Federal Law on the Freedom of Conscience and
>Religious Associations (no. 125-FZ of 26 September 1997 – “the Religions
>Act”) entered into force.
>56. The founding documents of religious organisations that had been
>established before the Religions Act were to be amended to conform to
>the Act and submitted for re-registration. Until so amended, the
>founding documents remained operative in the part which did not
>contradict the terms of the Act (section 27 § 3).

Makes sense. Covers the necessary bases.

>57. By letter of 27 December 1999 (no. 10766-??), the Ministry of
>Justice informed its departments that the Religions Act did not
>establish a special procedure for re-registration of religious
>organisations.

Okay.

>Since section 27 § 3 required them to bring their
>founding documents into conformity with the Religions Act, the
>applicable procedure was that for registration of amendments to the
>founding documents described in section 11 § 11.

Sure, 11:11.

>Section 11 § 11
>provided that the procedure for registration of amendments was the same
>as that for registration of a religious organisation.

Fair enough.

>58. The list of documents required for registration was set out in
>section 11 § 5 and ran as follows:
>“- application for registration;
>- list of founders of the religious organisation indicating their
>nationality, place of residence and dates of birth;
>- charter (articles of association) of the religious organisation;
>- minutes of the constituent assembly;
>- document showing the presence of the religious group in this
>territory for at least fifteen years...;
>- information on the basic tenets of creed and religious practices,
>including information on the origin of the religion and this
>association, forms and methods of activities, views on family and
>marriage, on education, particular views on health held by the religion
>followers, restrictions on civil rights and obligations imposed on
>members and ministers of the organisation;

Scientologists cannot but lie about this information. And any
government with this requirement for registering a claimed "religion"
is justified in denying Scientology's registration application.

>- information on the address (location) of the permanent governing body
>of the religious organisation, at which contact with the religious
>organisation is to be maintained;

This would be David Miscavige at RTC in the U.S.

>and - document on payment of the State duty.”

These all seem very reasonable.

>59. Section 12 § 1 stated that registration of a religious organisation
>could be refused if:
>“- aims and activities of a religious organisation contradict the
>Russian Constitution or Russian laws – with reference to specific legal
>provisions;

Certainly some of Scientology's actual aims and activities violate the
Russian Constitution or Russian laws.

>- the organisation has not been recognised as a religious one;

Well that's a problem. The U.S. Federal Government declares that the
most sociopathic organizations can be recognized as religious simply
by determining to be recognized as religious. Consequently the U.S.
has redefined what "religious" means. Because of this redefinition,
the whole subject should be discussed in the light of wisdom. The U.S.
Federal Government, however, refuses to discuss the subject, or even
permit such discussions in its justice system. Consequently, a
stupidity dominates.

>- the articles of association or other submitted materials do not comply
>with Russian legislation or contain inaccurate information;

There it is. Scientology loses on both counts. Somewhere within
Russian legislation is wisdom, with which Scientology can never
comply. And the information Scientology submitted cannot but be
inaccurate, indeed willfully false.

>- another religious organisation has already been registered under the
>same name;
>- the founder(s) has (have) no capacity to act.”

I'm unsure what that would mean.

>60. Section 27 § 4 in its original wording specified that the
>re-registration of religious organisations was to be completed by 31
>December 1999. Subsequently the time-limit was extended until 31
>December 2000.

That seems abundantly fair.

>Following the expiry of the time-limit, religious
>organisations were liable for dissolution by a judicial decision issued
>on application of a registration authority.

Well every statute must have its teeth.

>C. Case-law of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation
>61. Examining the compatibility with the Russian Constitution of the
>requirement of the Law that all religious organisations established
>before its entry into force should confirm that they have existed for at
>least fifteen years, the Constitutional Court found as follows (decision
>no. 16-P of 23 November 1999 in the case of Religious Society of
>Jehovah's Witnesses in Yaroslavl and Christian Glorification Church):
>“8. ... Pursuant to... the RSFSR Law on freedom of religion (as amended
>on 27 January 1995), all religious associations – both regional and
>centralised – had, on an equal basis, as legal entities, the rights that
>were subsequently incorporated in the Federal Law on freedom of
>conscience and religious associations...
>Under such circumstances legislators could not deprive a certain segment
>of religious organisations that had been formed and maintained full
>legal capacity of the rights belonging to them, solely on the basis that
>they did not have confirmation that they had existed for 15 years.

Right. They would need evidence concerning the nature of the
organization claiming to be religious.

>In
>relation to religious organisations created earlier, that would be
>incompatible with the principle of equality enshrined in Article 13 § 4,
>Article 14 § 2 and Article 19 §§ 1 and 2 of the Constitution of the
>Russian Federation, and would be an impermissible restriction on freedom
>of religion (Article 28) and the freedom of [voluntary] associations to
>form and to carry out their activities (Article 30)...”

Not, however, if their activities, by their sociopathy or criminality,
degrade the concept of religiousness.

>62. The Constitutional Court subsequently confirmed this position in
>its decision no. 46-O of 13 April 2000 in the case of Independent
>Russian Region of the Society of Jesus, and decision no. 7-O of 7
>February 2002 in the case of The Moscow Branch of the Salvation Army.
>III. RELEVANT COUNCIL OF EUROPE DOCUMENTS

It's unclear to me exactly what the "position" is, but it would be
interesting to read these decisions.

>63. Resolution 1278 (2002) on Russia's law on religion, adopted by the
>Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe on 23 April 2002, noted,
>in particular, the following:

Ah, the Council of Europe enters.

>“1. The new Russian law on religion entered into force on 1 October
>1997, abrogating and replacing a 1990 Russian law – generally considered
>very liberal – on the same subject. The new law caused some concern,
>both as regards its content and its implementation. Some of these
>concerns have been addressed, notably through the judgments of the
>Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation of 23 November 1999, 13
>April 2000 and 7 February 2002, and the religious communities'
>re-registration exercise at federal level successfully completed by the
>Ministry of Justice on 1 January 2001. However, other concerns remain.
>...
>5. Moreover, some regional and local departments of the Ministry of
>Justice have refused to (re)register certain religious communities,
>despite their registration at federal level.

That old "religious" meaning again. In Scientology's case, "religious"
means "irreligious" and "irreligious" means "religious," lying is a
sacrament, and fraud and criminality are very often the "greatest good
for the greatest number."

>The federal Ministry of
>Justice does not seem to be in a position to control these regional and
>local departments in accordance with the requirements of the rule of
>law, preferring to force religious communities to fight these local
>departments over registration in the courts rather than taking remedial
>action within the ministry...

I could see how in this age this approach, including Russian Runaround
tech, would be a reasonable response to bullying, sociopathic cults
like Scientology.

>6. Therefore, the Assembly recommends to the Russian authorities that:
>i. the law on religion be more uniformly applied throughout the Russian
>Federation, ending unjustified regional and local discrimination against
>certain religious communities and local officials' preferential
>treatment of the Russian Orthodox Church, and in particular their
>insisting in certain districts that religious organisations obtain prior
>agreement for their activities from the Russian Orthodox Church;

Ah, the ROC. It certainly is a problem for Scientology. Probably more
than any other large religious body or organization the ROC has
Scientology's number.

>ii. the federal Ministry of Justice become more proactive in resolving
>disputes between its local/regional officials and religious
>organisations before disputes are brought before the courts, by taking
>remedial action within the ministry in case of corruption and/or
>incorrect implementation of the law on religion, thus rendering it
>unnecessary to take such cases to the courts...”

Makes sense. I think that more involvement will be a good thing. And
so would be more discussion, and more of a permission, and even a
demand, to get to the facts of the actual nature of the entities
seeking "religion" status, and these entities' actual creeds and
practices.

>THE LAW
>I. ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLES 9, 10 AND 11 OF THE CONVENTION
>64. The applicant complained under Articles 9, 10 and 11 of the
>Convention that it had been arbitrarily stripped of its legal-entity
>status as a result of the refusal to re-register it as a religious
>organisation. The Court recalls that in a recent case it examined a
>substantially similar complaint about the refusal of re-registration of
>a religious organisation from the standpoint of Article 11 of the
>Convention read in the light of Article 9 (see The Moscow Branch of the
>Salvation Army v. Russia, no. 72881/01, §§ 74 and 75, ECHR 2006-...).
>The Court observes that the religious nature of the applicant was not
>disputed at the national level and it had been officially recognised as
>a religious organisation since 1994.

Is this the "religious nature" of the Scientology cult, or the Sally
Ann?

Clearly it is high time to identify and to challenge the "religious
nature" of Scientology.

> In the light of this, the Court
>finds that the applicant's complaints must be examined from the
>standpoint of Article 11 of the Convention read in the light of Article
>9.
>Article 9 provides as follows:
>“1. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and
>religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief
>and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or
>private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching,
>practice and observance.

Scientology violates this every day. Virtually every Scientologist is
*contracted* to violate this Article. Scientologists universally pay
their fees to support their religion's suppression and destruction of
the basic freedoms of thought, conscience, religion, speech and
association.

>2. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs shall be subject only
>to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a
>democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection
>of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights
>and freedoms of others.”

Scientologists universally are *contracted* to suppress and destroy
manifestations of religions and religious beliefs, with none of these
limiters present.

>Article 11 provides as follows:
>“1. Everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and to
>freedom of association with others, including the right to form and to
>join trade unions for the protection of his interests.

Good idea. Scientology also violates this provision.

>2. No restrictions shall be placed on the exercise of these rights other
>than such as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic
>society in the interests of national security or public safety, for the
>prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals
>or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others...”

Scientologists universally seek the right and freedom to suppress and
destroy others' rights and freedoms. There cannot but be a conflict
because the Scientologists' claimed rights and freedoms are so
suppressive and destructive of others' rights and freedoms.

>A. Arguments by the parties
>1. The Government
>65. The Government considered that there was no interference with the
>applicant's right to freedom of association because it had not been
>liquidated and retained the full capacity of a legal entity. On 10
>August 2002 it had been entered on the Unified State Register of Legal
>Entities and continued its religious activities. In refusing the Moscow
>Justice Department's action for dissolution, the Nikulinskiy District
>Court founded its judgment of 30 April 2002 on the evidence showing that
>the applicant had on-going financial and economic activities, such as
>the applicant's balance sheets and permission to stage events in
>municipal districts of Moscow. The Government maintained that the
>applicant could not claim to be a “victim” of any violation solely
>because it was not willing to bring its founding documents in compliance
>with the existing law.

Makes sense.

>66. The Government further submitted that there was no violation of the
>applicant's right to freedom of religion or any restriction on that
>right. The penalty imposed on the applicant “was not harsh and was not
>motivated by religious factors, but by a failure to submit to the
>Religions Act and violation of the administrative procedure”. The
>refusal of re-registration of the applicant did not entail a ban on its
>activity. Members of the applicant continued to profess their faith,
>hold services of worship and ceremonies, and guide their followers.

Fair enough. Without saying that worship means waging war, and
guidance means brainwashing, fraud and extortion.

>67. The Government pointed out that the District Court's judgment of 7
>August 2001 refusing re-registration of the applicant had had a lawful
>basis. The law required the original charter and registration
>certificate, the information on the basic tenets of religion, and the
>document indicating the legal address of the organisation. However, the
>applicant had failed to produce these documents and therefore the
>decision not to process the application for re-registration had been
>lawful.

That cannot but be true. Whatever Scientology submitted could not have
been the actual basic tenets of the religion.

>The Government claimed that the applicant is not precluded from
>lodging a new application for re-registration.

Sure. If Scientology submitted its actual basic tenets it could be
registered as a criminal conspiracy and a foreign intelligence
organization.

By its own basic tenets Scientology cannot become something different
from what its actual basic tenets make it, and consequently it cannot
but be inimical to society.

By putting the word "Scientology" in its name and in its teachings,
the applicant is proclaiming acceptance of the antisocial tenets that
are Scientology tenets around the world.

>2. The applicant
>68. The applicant challenged the Government's assertions that the
>applicant “possessed the full capacity as a legal entity” and that it
>“exercised financial, economic and other activity in full measure” as
>untrue. The result of the obstruction of the Moscow Justice Department,
>as upheld by the Presnenskiy District Court on 1 September 2003, was
>that the applicant had been “frozen in time” and deprived of a
>possibility to modify its founding documents – and, accordingly, its
>aims, structure and internal organisation

The Russian Scientologists can't actually modify these things, because
Scientology is a dictatorship and the dictator David Miscavige is in
the U.S.

The Moscow Scientology cultists *potentially* can tell the truth about
the actual aims, structure and internal organization. Failing that, an
outside examination of the evidence concerning the actual aims,
structure and internal organization could be made.

> – in accordance with the law
>and its changing needs. For example, the applicant had been barred from
>introducing into its charter the right to establish places of worship
>and new procedures for election and dismissal of its president.

Suddenly these are issues?

>Furthermore, the Press Ministry had denied registration of its newspaper
>for no other reason than the on-going uncertainty as regards the
>applicant's rights created by the refusal of re-registration. In that
>context, the entering of the applicant on the Unified State Register of
>Legal Entities had been made due to internal administrative reforms and
>did not constitute re-registration for the purposes of the Religions
>Act.

This would make sense. Scientology's basic tenets make it in violation
of the Religions Act. Before the Religions Act there was no Religions
Act for Scientology to be in violation of. Re-registration
requirements cleaned up the religious field by identifying Scientology
as a Religions Act violator and consequently not registerring/
re-registerring it.

>69. The applicant further contended that the Government's claim about
>their “unwillingness” to amend the founding documents was, at best,
>disingenuous.

Oh boy, Scientology, or its lawyers actually, *would* say that.

dis·in·gen·u·ous

Not straightforward or candid; insincere or calculating
Pretending to be unaware or unsophisticated; faux-naïf.
http://www.answers.com/disingenuous&r=67

I mentioned above Scientologists' pretended ignorance beingness.
Scientology's disingenuousness is willfully ordered, drilled and
enforced. Disdisingenuousness would be "out-security" meriting a
condition of "Treason" and the harshest "Ethics" penalties.

>Having submitted ten applications for re-registration to
>the Moscow Justice Department, the applicant not once refused to comply
>with the requirements imposed on it, whether “prescribed by law” or
>otherwise.

Sure it did. Scientology did not comply with the requirement that it
submit its basic tenets of creed and practices.

> The expiry of the time-limit without re-registration was
>directly linked to the Moscow Justice Department's persistent refusal to
>give any concrete explanation for rejection of applications.

I'm not sure. It seems to me the MJD repeatedly asked for
Scientology's basic tenets of creed and practices, and repeatedly got
anything but. For example Scientology's "creed."

creed

A formal statement of religious belief; a confession of faith.
A system of belief, principles, or opinions:

http://www.answers.com/creed&r=67

The actual Scientology creed is a contract to violate the PR "creed"
submitted to the Moscow Justice Department.

I must stress that aside from an English version of the book
Scientology: The Theology and Practice of a Contemporary Religion, I
have not seen what Scientology submitted to the MJD or any other body
or court in Russia. But I have over many years and in many contexts,
including court proceedings, observed the public statements
Scientology has made concerning its basic tenets of creed and
practices. Uniformly, the Scientology organization's representative
have lied about its basic tenets of creed and practices. It is clear
that in its submissions and in its interaction with the Russian
authorities concerning its "religious" status Scientology has not
changed that belief in lying nor the credal tenet and practice of
lying.

>Furthermore, its refusal to comply with a writ of execution was a
>particularly serious abuse in that the Ministry of Justice is itself in
>charge of the court bailiffs service and enforcement proceedings.

Well it's serious all right. But it's not necessarily an abuse. So far
the ECHR has not answered whether Scientology actually submitted what
it was required to submit.

>No
>“convincing and compelling” reasons were given by the Government for the
>on-going refusal to re-register the applicant, while the grounds relied
>upon in the judgment of 7 August 2001 were not “prescribed by law” as
>the law required neither simultaneous production of the documents nor
>any special form in which the information on “basic tenets of creed” was
>to be submitted.

Fine. I would agree. No special form for the “basic tenets of creed.”
It wouldn't need a special form; just the facts.

>70. Finally, as regards the Government's claim that the applicant is
>not precluded from submitting a new application for re-registration, it
>is, in the applicant's view, misleading and contrary to the facts.

"Misleading and contrary to the facts:" that's Scientology and its
submissions and declarations.

>A
>presumed “opportunity to apply” is meaningless when the Moscow Justice
>Department held – on at least five occasions in the nineteen months
>preceding the submission of the Government's observations – that the
>applicant was barred from re-registering due to the expired time-limit
>for re-registration.

Scientology had a significant amount of time to submit the actual
information on its actual tenets and practices. It is most probable
that it submitted false information over and over until it missed the
deadline to submit factual information.

It is altogether possible that the MJD, as it should have done,
investigated Scientology following its arrival on the Russian
landscape and following its first application for "religious" status
and discovered that Scientology is a dangerous, human rights
destroying, willfully dishonest cult that operates as a foreign
intelligence organization.

I even have a few of Scientology's Russian documents from the
2001-2002 period that show that the organization is dishonest and
dangerous.
http://www.gerryarmstrong.org/50grand/cult/scientology-da-docs.html#russiada

>The applicant submitted that even the most
>dispassionate review of the facts disclosed a single-minded
>determination on the part of the respondent State to deny
>re-registration to specific religious organisations, including the
>applicant, despite the lack of any “objective and reasonable
>justification” for doing so.

Well now is the time perhaps to give Scientology the “objective and
reasonable justification” it seeks.

>B. The Court's assessment
>1. General principles
>71. The Court refers to its settled case-law to the effect that, as
>enshrined in Article 9, freedom of thought, conscience and religion is
>one of the foundations of a “democratic society” within the meaning of
>the Convention.

Sure. And Scientology willfully violates Article 9 day in and day out.
And virtually all Scientologists are *contracted* to violate Article
9.

Religion clearly can include the suppression and destruction of
freedom of religion, as Scientology demonstrates,

>It is, in its religious dimension, one of the most vital
>elements that go to make up the identity of believers and their
>conception of life, but it is also a precious asset for atheists,
>agnostics, sceptics and the unconcerned.

Exactly. It's possible to see in this site how Scientology, which
created and maintains the site, seeks to destroy that vital element.
http://www.religiousfreedomwatch.org./anti-religious-extremists/gerald-armstrong/
Scientology is organized for the purpose of destroying freedom of
thought, conscience and religion.

>The pluralism indissociable
>from a democratic society, which has been dearly won over the centuries,
>depends on it (see Metropolitan Church of Bessarabia and Others v.
>Moldova, no. 45701/99, § 114, ECHR 2001-XII).

Exactly. That is why it is important to some to oppose Scientology's
efforts, including by exposure of its actual credal tenets and actual
practices.

>72. While religious freedom is primarily a matter of individual
>conscience,

Perfect. Unlike the present U.S. model which so favors the
conscienceless religious corporation that it crushes the individual
human conscience.

>it also implies, inter alia, freedom to “manifest [one's]
>religion” alone and in private or in community with others, in public
>and within the circle of those whose faith one shares.

Sure, but that implies that the manifestation of religion just by
being the manifestation of religion is moral and lawful. As
Scientology proves, the manifestation of religion can be immoral and
unlawful. Since Scientology *has* proved this fact beyond any
reasonable question, manifestations of religion cannot automatically
be given a pass.

To lie about the basic tenets of creed and practices of the
Scientology religion would be no different from lying about anything
else in submissions citizens, businesses or organizations must make to
various government offices. Scientology's position, which as a bluff
has had some success, is that because what is being asked for is
religious it can lie its head off with impunity. It might be possible
to cut right through that clear bluff.

>Since religious
>communities traditionally exist in the form of organised structures,
>Article 9 must be interpreted in the light of Article 11 of the
>Convention, which safeguards associative life against unjustified State
>interference.

Agreed. And there can be no maximum or minimum size to any
association. Associative life is safeguarded for me and my associates
as much as for Scientologists.

>Seen in that perspective, the right of believers to
>freedom of religion, which includes the right to manifest one's religion
>in community with others, encompasses the expectation that believers
>will be allowed to associate freely, without arbitrary State
>intervention.

Except that, as Scientology proves, its manifestation of religion in
community includes a criminal conspiracy against human rights,
extortion, Fair Game, and war against the state. As Scientology
proves, religious manifestations can be matters of national security.
So Scientology shouldn't get any more passes when it plays the
religion card.

>Indeed, the autonomous existence of religious communities
>is indispensable for pluralism in a democratic society and is thus an
>issue at the very heart of the protection which Article 9 affords. The
>State's duty of neutrality and impartiality, as defined in the Court's
>case-law, is incompatible with any power on the State's part to assess
>the legitimacy of religious beliefs (see Metropolitan Church of
>Bessarabia, cited above, §§ 118 and 123, and Hasan and Chaush v.
>Bulgaria [GC], no. 30985/96, § 62, ECHR 2000-XI).

Ah, the phony argument. No state would ever bother assessing the
legitimacy of religious beliefs. The state has no way of testing them.
No state would care whose beliefs were illegitimate.

What the state would care about are the claimed religious
organization's basic tenets of its creed and and its practices. The
state has to know this for the simple reason that, as Scientology
demonstrates, a religion's actual basic tenets of its creed and
practices can be antisocial, criminal and dangerous. A full
examination of Scientology's actual basic tenets of its creed and
practices can be made, however, without assessing the legitimacy of
its religious beliefs.

>73. The Court further reiterates that the right to form an association
>is an inherent part of the right set forth in Article 11.

Makes sense. I'm a participant in a number of associations, and a
founder of a few, including the Church of Wogs (CoW)®, the
Organization of United Renunciants (OUR)®, the Suppressive Person
Defense League (SPDL)®.

>That citizens
>should be able to form a legal entity in order to act collectively in a
>field of mutual interest is one of the most important aspects of the
>right to freedom of association, without which that right would be
>deprived of any meaning.

Oh that's a little hyperbolic. What if a criminal gang is prohibited,
which they are, from forming a "legal entity" in order to act
collectively in a field of mutual interest? Has the practice of
prohibiting groups with antisocial creeds and/or practices, really
deprived the right to freedom of association of any meaning? There are
a number of exceptions to the rule or principle of freedom of
association that might, in this age of manifold antisocial creeds and
practices, give it possibly an even deeper, more useful meaning.

>The way in which national legislation enshrines
>this freedom and its practical application by the authorities reveal the
>state of democracy in the country concerned.

Perhaps. But the way in which the ECHR deals with the Scientology
problem will also be revealing.

>Certainly States have a
>right to satisfy themselves that an association's aim and activities are
>in conformity with the rules laid down in legislation,

Well there we all are. Scientology's actual aim and activities are not
in conformity with the rules of any rational civilized state. Indeed,
Scientology considers the rational civilized states of the European
Union to comprise the Fourth Reich and have declared war, albeit
largely a covert one, on the EU and its institutions.

>but they must do
>so in a manner compatible with their obligations under the Convention
>and subject to review by the Convention institutions (see Sidiropoulos
>and Others v. Greece, judgment of 10 July 1998, Reports of Judgments and
>Decisions 1998-IV, § 40).

Scientology's actual aim and activities are in willful direct
violation of the Convention, and this organization perhaps should not
be given access to this Court as a complainant until it has eradicated
those Convention violations.

>74. As has been stated many times in the Court's judgments, not only is
>political democracy a fundamental feature of the European public order
>but the Convention was designed to promote and maintain the ideals and
>values of a democratic society.

Exactly. Scientology seeks to overthrow the democratic system and make
its human rights suppression and destruction "legal."

> Democracy, the Court has stressed, is
>the only political model contemplated in the Convention and the only one
>compatible with it.

Makes sense. Given the political models considered, democracy is the
best of the usual broad model set. The other options should have
perhaps been given.

Scientology has failed to demonstrate that it also is a better
political model. Scientology is the most totalitarian of
dictatorships, in fact open-ended. David Miscavige is Scientology's
dictator, if you ask him or other Scientologists, until his death.

> By virtue of the wording of the second paragraph of
>Article 11, and likewise of Articles 8, 9 and 10 of the Convention, the
>only necessity capable of justifying an interference with any of the
>rights enshrined in those Articles is one that may claim to spring from
>“democratic society” (see United Communist Party of Turkey and Others v.
>Turkey, judgment of 30 January 1998, Reports of Judgments and Decisions
>1998-I, §§ 43-45, and Refah Partisi (the Welfare Party) and Others v.
>Turkey [GC], nos. 41340/98, 41342/98, 41343/98 and 41344/98, §§ 86-89,
>ECHR 2003-II).

This term “democratic society” has a significance here beyond what is
apparent to me.

>75. The State's power to protect its institutions and citizens from
>associations that might jeopardise them must be used sparingly,

Sure. Whatever is required.

>as
>exceptions to the rule of freedom of association are to be construed
>strictly and only convincing and compelling reasons can justify
>restrictions on that freedom.

Good. Put Scientology on trial and let the public see if there are
convincing and compelling reasons that justify any restrictions. A
public trial that answers the question: What are Scientology's actual
creed and practices? This would also largely establish Scientology's
actual nature.

> Any interference must correspond to a
>“pressing social need”; thus, the notion “necessary” does not have the
>flexibility of such expressions as “useful” or “desirable” (see Gorzelik
>and Others v. Poland [GC], no. 44158/98, §§ 94-95, 17 February 2004,
>with further references).

So the standard is probably already in law. If society had found that
there was a pressing enough social need to enact a law prohibiting and
punishing fraud then the interference would be what is necessary to
successfully interfere in fraud cases.

>2. The applicant's status as a “victim” of the alleged violations

Ah, Scientologists as victims. Well, despite what Hubbard and
Scientology say, it is possible. If the word "victim" has any meaning
at all, any Scientologist can be one.

>76. In the Government's submission, so long as the applicant had not
>been dissolved and had retained its legal-entity status, there had been
>no interference with its Convention rights and it could not therefore
>claim to be a “victim” of any violation.

That could be right.

>77. The Court is not convinced by the Government's contention.

Good, call for a trial.

>It
>recalls that it has already examined a similar complaint by a religious
>association which was denied re-registration under the new Religions Act
>by the Russian authorities. It found that even in the absence of
>prejudice and damage, the religious association may claim to be a
>“victim” since the refusal of re-registration directly affected its
>legal position (see The Moscow Branch of the Salvation Army, cited
>above, §§ 64-65).

Have a trial on its basic creed and practices.

>It also found that the entering of the religious
>association into the Unified State Register of Legal Entities did not
>deprive it of its status as a “victim” so long as the domestic
>authorities had not acknowledged a violation of its Convention rights
>stemming from the refusal of re-registration (loc. cit., § 66).

That's odd. Seeking such an acknowledgement must have piqued the
interest of someone in the government and courts.

>The
>Court took note of the Moscow Justice Department's submission to a
>domestic court that the entering of information into the Unified State
>Register could not constitute “re-registration” within the meaning of
>the Religions Act (loc. cit., § 67).

The Russian Runaround might not be an option any more, so I think that
confronting Scientology on its creed and practices head on is timely.

>78. Turning to the present case, the Court notes that the situation of
>the applicant is similar to that of the applicant in the case of The
>Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army.

Interesting. The natures of the two applicants, one would think, are
very different. They could, of course, share a factor, such as being
foreign intelligence organizations, a factor that would possibly dwarf
or trump all the other factors when considering an applicant's basic
creed and practices. I don't know, obviously, if the Sally Ann is
involved, as I know Scientology is, in espionage.

>The applicant was denied
>re-registration required by the Religions Act and the entering of
>information concerning the applicant into the Unified State Register of
>Legal Entities was solely linked to the establishment of that register
>and to the shifting of registration competence from one authority to
>another following enactment of a new procedure for registration of legal
>entities (loc. cit., § 67).

So they were allowed to operate, but didn't get an apology for
violation of their Convention rights by not being given a second
permission (re-registration) to operate?

> The national authorities have never
>acknowledged the alleged breach of the applicant's Convention rights and
>have not afforded any redress.

Well here's the chance. A trial that identifies Scientology's basic
and actual (it goes without saying, but with Scientology you have to
say it) creed and practices.

> The judgments by which the refusal of
>re-registration was upheld, have not been set aside and have remained in
>force to date.

Good. There are probably a number of courts or proceedings available
now in which Scientology's creed and practices can be examined and
identified. This will provide some declaratory relief for society,
since it is to society that Scientology directs its claims of what its
creed and practices are.

>The Nikulinskiy District Court's judgment of 30 April
>2002, to which the Government referred, only concerned the proceedings
>for dissolution of the applicant and was of no consequence for its claim
>for re-registration.

Good. We can move on from there then.

>79. Likewise, the Court finds unconvincing the Government's argument
>that the applicant may not claim to be a “victim” because it has not
>taken so far appropriate steps for properly applying for
>re-registration.

That cannot but be true, because Scientology cannot but lie as to what
its “basic tenets of creed and practices of the religion" actually
are.

> Over a course of six years from 1999 to 2005 the
>applicant has filed no fewer than eleven applications for
>re-registration, attempting to remedy the defects of the submitted
>documents, both those that were identified by the domestic authorities
>and those that were supposed to exist in the instances where the Justice
>Department gave no indication as to their nature (see, for example,
>paragraphs 11, 15 or 17 above).

Eleven applications, if they all contain, as they must, false
statements as to the basic tenets of creed and practices of the
religion, are excellent evidence of Scientology's duplicitous and
dangerous nature and goals.

>The Government did not specify by
>operation of which legal provisions the applicant may still re-apply for
>re-registration now that such application would obviously be belated
>following the expiry of the extended time-limit on 31 December 2000.

I suppose that if a religion can change its basic creed and practices
to the extent of adding a credal tenet and practice of admitting to
its actual creed and practices, it can easily change its name and not
re-apply, but just plain apply.

A Scientology that admitted to its actual creed and practices would
not be Scientology, which requires that all Scientologists lie about
their religion's creed and practices.

But, without the Scientologists themselves admitting to what their
actual creed and practices are, the government bodies that must
register or license such religions or religious entities have a duty
to investigate the organization to identify its actual creed and
practices.

>In
>fact, the Justice Department invoked the expiry of that time-limit as
>the ground for refusing to process the seventh to tenth applications for
>re-registration by the applicant (see paragraphs 34, 38, 41 and 44
>above). It follows that the applicant has been denied re-registration to
>date.

That's a good starting point. With this ECHR decision and in the
re-registration process now confronting the Justice Department and
Scientology, I would imagine that there may be an opportunity to
investigate and identify the cult's actual basic creed and practices.

>80. Having regard to the above considerations, the Court finds that the
>applicant may “claim” to be a “victim” of the violations complained of.
>In order to ascertain whether it has actually been a victim, the merits
>of its contentions have to be examined.

That will be good, *if* the ECHR here recognizes that Scientology is
withholding its actual basic creed and practices and submitting false
statements concerning its creed and practices.

Obviously the ECHR has not yet had the realization that Scientology is
a criminal conspiracy to violate the rights the Court is charged with
upholding.

>3. Existence of interference with the applicant's rights
>81. In the light of the general principles outlined above, the ability
>to establish a legal entity in order to act collectively in a field of
>mutual interest is one of the most important aspects of freedom of
>association, without which that right would be deprived of any meaning.

As discussed as well above, there are exceptions to the rule of
freedom of association. An American CIA agent, for example, might not
be free to establish the Church of the Company in Moscow so that all
the CIA agents can act collectively in the field of espionage. Freedom
of association does not lose all meaning by restricting al Qaeda from
establishing a legal entity, e.g., the Church of the Martyrs, in order
to act collectively in the field of terrorism.

>The Court has expressed the view that a refusal by the domestic
>authorities to grant legal-entity status to an association of
>individuals may amount to an interference with the applicants' exercise
>of their right to freedom of association (see Gorzelik, cited above, §
>52 et passim, and Sidiropoulos, cited above, § 31 et passim).

Sure it can. But given Scientology's antisocial nature and goals and
given its clear, indeed contractual, violations of basic human rights,
was it an unjustified interference?

>Where the
>organisation of the religious community is at issue, a refusal to
>recognise it also constitutes interference with the applicants' right to
>freedom of religion under Article 9 of the Convention (see Metropolitan
>Church of Bessarabia, cited above, § 105).

Sure. And since Scientology has demonstrated for years that antisocial
and criminal practices can be religious expression, the lone fact that
interference with religious freedom occurs is meaningless. Since it is
unlikely that Scientology is going to cease calling its antisocial and
criminal practices religious expression, it is necessary to
investigate all claimed religious expressions to identify and restrict
any that are antisocial or criminal.

>The believers' right to
>freedom of religion encompasses the expectation that the community will
>be allowed to function peacefully, free from arbitrary State
>intervention (see Hasan and Chaush v. Bulgaria [GC], no. 30985/96, § 62,
>ECHR 2000-XI).

And the rest of society have an expectation of the same absence of
arbitraries. In other words, that Scientology's antisocial and
criminal activities are dealt with exactly the same as the antisocial
and criminal activities of an organization that doesn't claim all its
activities are religious expressions.

>82. The Court observes that in 1997 the respondent State enacted a new
>Religions Act which required all the religious organisations that had
>been previously granted legal-entity status to amend their founding
>documents in conformity with the new Act and to have them
> “re-registered” within a specific time-period. A failure to obtain
>“re-registration” for whatever reason before the expiry of the
>time-limit exposed the religious organisation to a threat of dissolution
>by judicial decision (see paragraph 56 above).

I would suppose every nation can do this. If proper notice was given
to all organizations affected by the new act, it seems reasonable.

>83. The Court notes that before the enactment of the new Religions Act
>the applicant had lawfully operated in Russia since 1994. It was unable
>to obtain “re-registration” as required by the Religions Act and by
>operation of law became liable for dissolution.

It is likely that the Russian authorities discovered since 1994 that
Scientology is not your usual religion, but a totalitarian cult that
operates a commercial bait-and-switch fraud and conspires to violate
basic human rights and to victimize Russia's citizens.

> Even though the
>Constitutional Court's ruling later removed the immediate threat of
>dissolution of the applicant, it is apparent that its legal capacity is
>not identical to that of other religious organisations that obtained
>re-registration certificates (see The Moscow Branch of The Salvation
>Army, cited above, § 73).

Good. Scientology's basic creed and practices are not identical to
other religious organizations either.

> The Court observes that the absence of
>re-registration was invoked by the Russian authorities as a ground for
>refusing registration of amendments to the charter and for staying the
>registration of a religious newspaper (see paragraphs 46 to 52 above).

Would this be "Religion, Law and Freedom," in the mold, I would
imagine, of Scientology's English language black propaganda organ
"Freedom."

It will be interesting to see what the charter amendments are. It
seems impossible that Scientology would ever submit accurate
information concerning its actual creed and practices; but I suppose
it is conceivable. I would be happy to identify what I know are
Scientology's actual basic tenets of creed and practices.

>84. The Court has already found in a similar case that this situation
>disclosed an interference with the religious organisation's right to
>freedom of association and also with its right to freedom of religion in
>so far as the Religions Act restricted the ability of a religious
>association without legal-entity status to exercise the full range of
>religious activities (see The Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army, cited
>above, § 74).

http://preview.tinyurl.com/2p5hde

In the case of the Moscow Branch of the Salvation Army v. Russia,

The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting as a
Chamber composed of:

Mr C.L. Rozakis, President,

Mrs N. Vajic,
Mr A. Kovler,
Mrs E. Steiner,
Mr K. Hajiyev,
Mr D. Spielmann,

Mr S.E. Jebens, judges,

and Mr S. Nielsen, Section Registrar,

vs.

In the case of Church of Scientology Moscow v. Russia,

The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting as a
Chamber composed of:

Mr C.L. Rozakis, President,
Mr L. Loucaides,
Mrs N. Vajic,
Mr A. Kovler,
Mrs E. Steiner,
Mr K. Hajiyev,
Mr D. Spielmann, judges,
and Mr S. Nielsen, Section Registrar,

Just the same, except for Loucaides instead of Jebens.

>These findings are applicable in the present case as well.
>85. Accordingly, the Court considers that there has been interference
>with the applicant's rights under Article 11 of the Convention read in
>the light of Article 9 of the Convention. It must therefore determine
>whether the interference satisfied the requirements of paragraph 2 of
>those provisions, that is whether it was “prescribed by law”, pursued
>one or more legitimate aims and was “necessary in a democratic society”
>(see, among many authorities, Metropolitan Church of Bessarabia, cited
>above, § 106).

It seems to me this a wrong step. After determining that there had
been interference, the case should have been sent back to the trier of
fact to determine if the interference was legally justified. It's
doubtful if all the reasons for such interference were in the court
record. There is, however, at least one large reason for interference
that is in the record: the fact that Scientology had not submitted
information detailing its actual basic creed and practices.

>4. Justification for the interference
>(a) General principles applicable to the analysis of justification
>86. The Court reiterates that the restriction on the rights to freedom
>of religion and assembly, as contained in Articles 9 and 11 of the
>Convention, is exhaustive.

I'm not sure what that means. The restriction on rights provided in 9
and 11 is *thorough*, or *complete*?

> The exceptions to the rule of freedom of
>association are to be construed strictly and only convincing and
>compelling reasons can justify restrictions on that freedom.

Such as if Scientology submitted false statements to obtain its
permission to be a legal entity?

>In
>determining whether a necessity within the meaning of paragraph 2 of
>these Convention provisions exists, the States have only a limited
>margin of appreciation,

I'm not sure what that means either. A limited margin of *judgment,*
or *opinion*?

> which goes hand in hand with rigorous European
>supervision embracing both the law and the decisions applying it,
>including those given by independent courts (see Gorzelik, cited above,
>§ 95; Sidiropoulos, cited above, § 40; and Stankov and the United
>Macedonian Organisation Ilinden v. Bulgaria, nos. 29221/95 and 29225/95,
>§ 84, ECHR 2001-IX).

Okay.

>87. When the Court carries out its scrutiny, its task is not to
>substitute its own view for that of the relevant national authorities
>but rather to review the decisions they delivered in the exercise of
>their discretion.

Sounds good.

>This does not mean that it has to confine itself to
>ascertaining whether the respondent State exercised its discretion
>reasonably, carefully and in good faith; it must look at the
>interference complained of in the light of the case as a whole and
>determine whether it was “proportionate to the legitimate aim pursued”
>and whether the reasons adduced by the national authorities to justify
>it are “relevant and sufficient”.

Good. I hope the ECHR does this, but it appears already that the Court
has avoided the obvious reason that justifies the Russian courts' and
authorities' failure, if it happened, to register or re-register
Scientology: that the organization had failed to submit accurate
information concerning its actual basic creed and practices.

> In so doing, the Court has to satisfy
>itself that the national authorities applied standards which were in
>conformity with the principles embodied in the Convention and, moreover,
>that they based their decisions on an acceptable assessment of the
>relevant facts (see United Communist Party of Turkey, cited above, § 47,
>and Partidul Comunistilor (Nepeceristi) and Ungureanu v. Romania, no.
>46626/99, § 49, ECHR 2005-I (extracts)).

That would be reasonable.

>(b) Arguments put forward in justification of the interference
>88. The Court observes that the grounds for refusing re-registration of
>the applicant were not consistent throughout the time it attempted to
>secure re-registration. The first application was rejected by reference
>to on-going criminal proceedings against the church president and the
>second one for textual discrepancies between the charter and the
>Religions Act (see paragraphs 9 and 11 above). The third to sixth
>applications were not processed for a failure to submit a complete set
>of documents and that ground was also endorsed by the District and City
>Courts (see paragraphs 15, 17, 19, and 28 above).

That is clearly the basic reason and justification for refusing
re-registration. Scientology would never submit a complete set of even
its Scripture; let alone the documents documenting its actual creed
and practices.

>The expiry of the
>time-limit for re-registration was invoked as the ground for leaving the
>seventh to tenth applications unexamined. After the courts determined
>that the refusal to examine the amended charter had had no lawful basis,
>the Justice Department refused the eleventh application on a new ground,
>notably the failure to produce a document showing the applicant's
>presence in Moscow for at least fifteen years (see paragraph 51 above).

I could see where Scientology, by refusing over and over to provide
the required documents, would be given the Russian Royal Runaround.
This is Scientology pretending to be stupid. Its agents pretend that
what they submit is the truth, knowing beyond question the
submission's substance is false. Also again, the substance is
Scientology's actual creed and practices.

But there are several facts I'm missing; and obviously the ECHR, this
being a Scientology case, has a small mountain of documents in the
record that the judges studied.

Is there a way of obtaining the record?

Perhaps the ARSCC could have someone from the Strasbourg Bureau pop
over to the Court and take a look at the file. It's this building:
http://www.echr.coe.int/ECHR/EN/Header/The+Court/The+Court/Information+on+the+building/

And Strasbourg, no matter what, is in France.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strasbourg

Ah, I see Karlsruhe is close by.

How governments or the justice systems are best to deal with a claimed
religion whose creed and practices are antisocial or criminal and
whose members willfully lie about them and hide them has not yet been
established. Some things are pretty well universal; e.g., the rights
guaranteed by the Convention. But how about a religion whose
religious practice or religious expression is to make a mockery of the
Convention, or whose members comprise a conspiracy against the rights
the Convention sets out?

>89. The justification for the interference advanced by the Government
>focussed on the findings of the District Court, as upheld on appeal by
>the City Court, which determined that the applicant failed to submit
>certain documents and sufficient information on its religious creed.

Right. I'd bet that is exactly what Scientology did and did not do.

It is virtually impossible for Scientology and Scientologists to
provide their actual creed, because their creed include lying, as well
as other antisocial and harmful practices.

>90. Since the existence of concurrent criminal proceedings and textual
>discrepancies between the text of the Religions Act and the applicant's
>charter were not identified by the domestic courts as valid grounds for
>refusal of re-registration, the Court will first examine the arguments
>relating to the submission of the allegedly incomplete set of documents.

Okay. I'd have to agree. There are simply too few facts in this
decision so far about the criminal case to take it up now.

But the allegedly incomplete set of documents; that's the issue.

>91. The Court observes that the Moscow Justice Department refused to
>process at least four applications for re-registration, referring to the
>applicant's alleged failure to submit a complete set of documents (see
>paragraphs 15, 17, 19 and 28 above). However, it did not specify why it
>deemed the applications incomplete.

This is a Russian Standoff. Almost always I'd think the state wins.
People have had Scientology's number in Russia from long before I
first was there, including Moscow, in 2001. And many people in Russia
have continued to learn more about this organization, to expose its
real creed, etc., and to educate society, including the Russian
authorities, on its nature, policies and practices.

> Responding to a written inquiry by
>the applicant's president, the Moscow Justice Department explicitly
>declined to indicate what information or document was considered
>missing, claiming that it was not competent to do so (see paragraph 15
>above).

That's very interesting, and completely true. If Scientology doesn't
submit an accurate statement, or documentation, of its actual creed
and practices, all the MJD could logically do is disapprove the
application. The MJD really is not competent to identify what words
Scientology must say or what documents it would have to submit to
adequately describe the religion's actual creed and practices. Only
Scientology is competent to provide its information concerning its
actual creed and practices.

Scientology's information submitted can be either true or false. It is
up to the authority to whom Scientology submits its information or
documentation to determine if it is true or false, or incomplete. If
it is adjudged that the information is false, I could see how the
authorities might respond that Scientology had failed to submit a
complete set of documents, or similar.

I could also see where the MJD and the other authorities might avoid
actually detailing for Scientology what its actual creed and practices
are. Now such detailing will have a much larger audience.

>The Court notes the inconsistent approach of the Moscow Justice
>Department on the one hand accepting that it was competent to determine
>the application incomplete but on the other hand declining its
>competence to give any indication as to the nature of the allegedly
>missing elements.

That is perhaps problematic. But then Scientology is a new phenomenon
in the Russian halls of justice. The cult, as has already been shown,
celebrates this position they've put themselves in as a "big win."

Here's another report:
http://www.scientologytoday.org/press/704042347361_scn-int.html

> Not only did that approach deprive the applicant of an
>opportunity to remedy the supposed defects of the applications and
>re-submit them,

Well, actually not. Scientology had the same opportunity; but lacked
whatever hint the MJD witheld from them. In truth, the Scientologists
responsible for the submission and its accuracy are aware that the
information is false, and require no hint. These are the same people
-- David Miscavige and his lieutenants -- who direct and control what
Scientology's creed and practices are, and in fact enforce the
falseness of the information submitted.

>but also it ran counter to the express requirement of
>the domestic law that any refusal must be reasoned.

Wow, that is quite a project actually. And educating someone, or a
unit, in the MJD or some other Russian government department or court
to be able to put together a reasoned and unassailable statement of
Scientology's actual creed and actual practices is not an overnight
process. Well, Scientology has certainly been the mother of all
importunate widows.

>By not stating clear
>reasons for rejecting the applications for re-registration submitted by
>the applicant, the Moscow Justice Department acted in an arbitrary
>manner. Consequently, the Court considers that that ground for refusal
>was not “in accordance with the law”.

Okay. But all they can be asked to do now is issue a ground for
refusal that is in accordance with law. It's a project, but easily
doable, and socially valuable. That will also give Scientology
something clear to assail, and be in itself a benefit in educating
Europe and the world as to Scientology's actual creed and practices. I
will make myself and my archive available for this project.

>92. Examining the applicant's complaint for a second time, the District
>Court advanced more specific reasons for the refusal, the first of them
>being a failure to produce the original charter, registration
>certificate and the document indicating the legal address (see paragraph
>30 above).

Those are just clerical items. Usually Scientology's legal reps cover
the clerical bases and lie about the substantive parts. But
Scientology might not have wanted to part with the originals. Or some
other reason.

>With regard to this ground the Court notes that the Religions
>Act contained an exhaustive list of documents that were to accompany an
>application for re-registration.

Can someone get this list?

>That list did not require any specific
>form in which these documents were to be submitted, whether as originals
>or in copies (see paragraph 58 above).

Fair enough. I'd say accept copies in most cases.

>According to the Court's settled
>case-law, the expression “prescribed by law” requires that the impugned
>measure should have a basis in domestic law and also that the law be
>formulated with sufficient precision to enable the citizen to foresee
>the consequences which a given action may entail and to regulate his or
>her conduct accordingly (see, as a classic authority, Sunday Times v.
>the United Kingdom (no. 1), judgment of 26 April 1979, Series A no. 30,
>§ 49). The requirement to submit the original documents did not follow
>from the text of the Religions Act and no other regulatory documents
>which might have set out such a requirement were referred to in the
>domestic proceedings. It was not mentioned in the grounds for the
>refusal advanced by the Moscow Justice Department or in the Presidium's
>decision remitting the matter for a new examination, but appeared for
>the first time in the District Court's judgment.

That's odd. It had to have been an extremely routine matter involving
an extremely unroutine religion or cult.

>In these circumstances,
>the Court is unable to find that the domestic law was formulated with
>sufficient precision enabling the applicant to foresee the adverse
>consequences which the submission of copies would entail.

Except everyone knows the copies issue is irrelevant. What are
relevant are Scientology's creed and practices, and whether
Scientology submitted false information concerning them.

>Furthermore,
>the Court considers that the requirement to enclose originals with each
>application would have been excessively burdensome, or even impossible,
>to fulfil in the instant case.

Fair enough. I don't know if the copies issue is part of the
traditional Russian Runaround, or a red herring, or a good try. Again
what's relevant are Scientology's actual creed and practices.

>The Justice Department was under no legal
>obligation to return the documents enclosed with applications it had
>refused to process and it appears that it habitually kept them in the
>registration file.

Imagine the paper in Moscow. And Scientology has only been there
fifteen years or so.

> As there exists only a limited number of original
>documents, the requirement to submit originals with each application
>could have the effect of making impossible re-submission of rectified
>applications for re-registration because no more originals were
>available.

Ah, the Russian Runaround also runs you out of original documents.

>This would have rendered the applicant's right to apply for
>re-registration as merely theoretical rather than practical and
>effective as required by the Convention (see Artico v. Italy, judgment
>of 13 May 1980, Series A no. 37, § 33).

Exactly. It is time to end the Runaround and conduct an investigation
and hearing into Scientology's creed and practices. Once those are
identified and adequately described, adjudicate whether any are in
violation of the Convention or the Russian Constitution or laws or any
other applicable laws or human rights charters. On that basis, decide
to grant or deny Scientology's application. If it is decided to deny
the application, provide Scientology copious reasons for the denial.

> It was pointed out by the
>applicant, and not contested by the Government, that the Moscow Justice
>Department had in its possession the original charter and registration
>certification, as well as the document evidencing its address, which had
>been included in the first application for re-registration in 1999 and
>never returned to the applicant.

I'm sure Scientology made a marvelous thing of this clerical matter.

> In these circumstances, the District
>Court's finding that the applicant was responsible for the failure to
>produce these documents was devoid of both factual and legal basis.

Without knowing the District Court's reasoning, it probably is not a
valid ground for refusal of Scientology's application. The substantive
issues; e.g., information concerning the creed and practices, are a
very different story.

>93. The Nikulinskiy District Court also determined that the applicant
>had not produced information on the basic tenets of creed and practices
>of the religion.

Exactly.

>The Court has previously found that the refusal of
>registration for a failure to present information on the fundamental
>principles of a religion may be justified in the particular
>circumstances of the case by the necessity to determine whether the
>denomination seeking recognition presented any danger for a democratic
>society (see Cârmuirea Spirituala a Musulmanilor din Republica Moldova
>v. Moldova (dec.), no. 12282/02, 14 June 2005).

That's the Scientology situation. It is a danger for a democratic
society. That is what can be shown through identifying and describing
Scientology's creed and practices. The fact is that Scientology
officially views the European Union as the Fourth Reich, and has its
members wage war upon it.

>The situation obtaining
>in the present case was different. It was not disputed that the
>applicant had submitted a book detailing the theological premises and
>practices of Scientology.

Clearly Scientology has fooled or co-opted the ECHR. The book
Scientology: The Theology and Practice of a Contemporary Religion that
was submitted can only provide what *Scientology says* are its
theological premises and practices.

> The District Court did not explain why the
>book was not deemed to contain sufficient information on the basic
>tenets and practices of the religion required by the Religions Act.

Okay. *Now* is apparently the time to explain why.

>The
>Court reiterates that, if the information contained in the book was not
>considered complete, it was the national courts' task to elucidate the
>applicable legal requirements and thus give the applicant clear notice
>how to prepare the documents (see The Moscow Branch of The Salvation
>Army, cited above, § 90, and Tsonev v. Bulgaria, no. 45963/99, § 55, 13
>April 2006). This had not, however, been done. Accordingly, the Court
>considers that this ground for refusing re-registration has not been
>made out.

Well this ground certainly *now* can be made out, since Scientology
has gone to such lengths to avoid submitting its Scripture, which
should include, of course, the basic tenets of creed of the religion.

Any religion can submit its Scripture for reading and study.
Christianity the Bible; Islam the Qur'an; Buddhism the Buddha-Dharma,
I suppose. Scientology submitted a book that only *describes* its
Scripture, and describes it falsely. But it is impossible that
Scientology submitted its actual Scripture.

Scrip·ture

A sacred writing or book.
A passage from such a writing or book.
The sacred writings of the Bible. Often used in the plural. Also
called Holy Scriptures.

scripture A statement regarded as authoritative.

http://www.answers.com/scripture&r=67

Scientology has defined itself, ironically for legal and commercial
purposes, into a religious corner from which it cannot legally escape.

[Quote]

The Scripture of the Scientology religion consists of the writings and
recorded spoken words of L. Ron Hubbard on the subjects of Dianetics
and Scientology. This Scripture includes more than half a million
written pages, over 3,000 tape-recorded lectures and some 100 films.

This Scientology Scripture is the sole source of all doctrine
regarding the religion of Scientology and it is an inherent principle
of the religion that only by exactly following the path it outlines
can mankind achieve spiritual salvation. This concept of orthodoxy in
religious practice is fundamental to Scientology. Thus, any attempt to
alter or misrepresent the Scientology Scripture is regarded as a most
severe breach of ecclesiastical ethics.

[End Quote]
http://www.scripturalscientology.org/

Scientology knows what its Scripture is. Scientology knows what its
basic tenets of creed of the religion are. It's at a minimum, half a
million written pages, over 3,000 tape-recorded lectures and some 100
films. To omit anything from the Scientology Scripture or Canon
submitted in response to a request for its basic tenets of creed and
practices of the religion is by that Scripture a most severe breach of
the religion's ecclesiastical ethics.

Scientology knows too what its practices are. What are, for example
its programs for dealing with "Suppressive Persons?" What are its
practices when dealing with criticism or critics? One would need to
have the exact, complete Scripture to compare with Scientology's
statement or description of its practices.

See, e.g., this Scientology Scripture:

[Quote]

HUBBARD COMMUNICATIONS OFFICE
Saint Hill Manor, East Grinstead, Sussex
HCO BULLETIN OF 5 NOVEMBER 1967

BPI

CRITICS OF SCIENTOLOGY

[...]

"Now, get this as a technical fact, not a hopeful idea. Every time we
have investigated the background of a critic of Scientology, we have
found crimes for which that person or group could be imprisoned under
existing law. We do not find critics of Scientology who do not have
criminal pasts. Over and over we prove this.

[...]

We are slowly and carefully teaching the unholy a lesson. It is as
follows: "We are not a law enforcement agency. BUT we will become
interested in the crimes of people who seek to stop us. If you oppose
Scientology we promptly look up—and will find and expose your crimes.
If you leave us alone we will leave you alone."

It's very simple. Even a fool can grasp that.

And don't underrate our ability to carry it out.

[...]

Never discuss Scientology with the critic. Just discuss his or her
crimes, known and unknown. And act completely confident that those
crimes exist. Because they do."

— L. Ron Hubbard

[End Quote]
http://www.suppressiveperson.org/fair_game/critics-scn.html

The clear fact is that one book cannot possibly constitute
Scientology's Scripture. Scientology knows exactly what constuitutes
its Scripture, and that its Scripture is *not* a mere book merely
*interpreting* its Scripture. It is extremely disingenuous of
Scientology, knowing that its Scripture is minimally half a million
written pages, over 3,000 tape-recorded lectures and some 100 films,
to claim that it didn't know why the single book that it submitted
instead of its actual Scripture was rejected.

The first step would be to restart the registration process, and again
demand of Scientology its basic tenets of creed and practices of the
religion.

The ECHR simply cannot logically or honestly rule that what
Scientology submitted are its actual basic tenets of creed of the
religion, because Scientology simply has *not* submitted its actual
basic tenets of creed of the religion. A trial or evidentiary hearing
is necessary to compare what Scientology submits with what is known
about its Scripture; e.g., that even Scientology admits that it
consists of half a million written pages, over 3,000 tape-recorded
lectures and some 100 films.

What Scientology submitted, as an *interpretation* or *description*of
its Scripture and practices, moreover, cannot but be, as discussed
above, a false statement.

>94. The Court does not consider it necessary to examine whether the
>refusals grounded on the expiry of the time-limit for re-registration
>were justified because in the subsequent proceedings the domestic courts
>acknowledged that the Moscow Justice Department's decision not to
>process an application for registration of the amended charter on that
>ground was unlawful (see paragraphs 47 and 48 above).

Good.

> In any event, as
>the Court has found above, the applicant's failure to secure
>re-registration within the established time-limit was a direct
>consequence of arbitrary rejection of its earlier applications by the
>Moscow Justice Department.

Not necessarily.

You're suppose to submit a duck, but you show up with a bat. The
authority says, "Sorry that's rejected." You go away, and come back
with a slug. The authority again says, "Sorry, rejected."

And you keep coming back with your bat, or your slug, or both, and you
keep demanding why your duck wasn't accepted. You keep getting told in
so many ways that your submission was not a duck, or it didn't pass
the duck test.

You collect up years of rejections, you pull off all the machinations
imaginable, and you get the ECHR to accept your case. And the ECHR
says what? That the creatures you submitted are actually perfectly
acceptable ducks?

Or just that the authority who rejected your bat and your slug should
have explained that they weren't ducks because they weren't
wide-beaked water birds?

This idea that the people running Scientology were somehow left in the
dark as to what constituted the basic tenets of creed and practices of
the religion they run is very funny.

>95. Finally, as regards the rejection of the most recent, eleventh
>application on the ground that the document showing fifteen-year
>presence in Moscow had not been produced (see paragraph 51 above), the
>Court notes that this requirement had no lawful basis. The
>Constitutional Court had determined already in 2002 that no such
>document should be required from organisations which had existed before
>the entry into force of the Religions Act in 1997 (see paragraph 61
>above). The applicant had been registered as a religious organisation
>since 1994 and fell into that category.

Yes, I'd say shelf this issue. And I'd say seize the opportunity to
confront Scientology on its creed or Scripture and its practices.

>96. It follows that the grounds invoked by the domestic authorities for
>refusing re-registration of the applicant had no lawful basis.

No it doesn't follow. Re-registration apparently required that the
applicant submit its basic tenets of creed and practices of its
religion. It has not been shown that Scientology submitted such
documentation; indeed it has been shown that Scientology could not
have done so.

>A further
>consideration relevant for the Court's assessment of the proportionality
>of the interference is that by the time the re-registration requirement
>was introduced, the applicant had lawfully existed and operated in
>Moscow as an independent religious community for three years.

Clearly, as Scientology demonstrates, commercial enterprises,
totalitarian cults with antisocial and anti-democratic goals, and
criminal conspiracies against rights, can be religions and can exist
many years without ever having to submit their basic tenets of creed
and practices. But any such organization should be able to do so and
should be required to do so when asked if there is any legitimate
question as to whether its creed or practices violate the Convention,
or other international and national human rights charters and laws.

>It has not
>been submitted that the community as a whole or its individual members
>had been in breach of any domestic law or regulation governing their
>associative life and religious activities.

Well, to begin with, it failed to submit its creed, or its Scripture,
and what it did submit cannot but be a false statement of its creed
and practices.

> In these circumstances, the

>Court considers that the reasons for refusing re-registration should
>have been particularly weighty and compelling (see The Moscow Branch of
>The Salvation Army, cited above, § 96, and the case-law cited in
>paragraph 86 above).

Good. Weighty and compelling is a legal standard that in this
Scientology case is not hard to meet.

Weighty is a good description for Scientology's Scripture. And the
omission of Scientology's Scripture from its submission would be a
weighty and compelling reason for refusal of the re-registration
application.

> In the present case no such reasons have been put
>forward by the domestic authorities.

No, I think that an incomplete set of documents submitted repeatedly
is such a reason. Plus there *is* specific language, such as "the book

submitted by the applicant did not qualify to be the “information on

the basic tenets of creed and practices of the religion.” The ECHR
cannot instruct a nation on what a religion's basic tenets of creed
and practices are. As Scientology demonstrates, such basic tenets of
creed and practices can be very different from what an organization
applying to be registered as a religion submits as its basic tenets of
creed and practices.

>97. In view of the Court's finding above that the reasons invoked by
>the Moscow Justice Department and endorsed by the Moscow courts to deny
>re-registration of the applicant branch had no legal basis, it can be
>inferred that, in denying registration to the Church of Scientology of
>Moscow, the Moscow authorities did not act in good faith and neglected
>their duty of neutrality and impartiality vis-à-vis the applicant's
>religious community (see The Moscow Branch of The Salvation Army, cited
>above, § 97).

In that there *is* a weighty and compelling legal basis to deny
Scientology registration until such time as it complied with the
registration rules, the ECHR's finding here of bad faith and neglect
of duty is unfair.

This unfair bad faith ruling is possibly a good reason to not accept
the ECHR's decision but to do what is possible to have it corrected..

The ECHR has not, so far in this decision, criticized the Russian
requirement that an organization applying to be registered as a
religious entity must submit its basic tenets of creed and practices.
That requirement appears reasonable and unchallenged. In fact, it is a
requirement that other countries could perhaps profitably adopt.

If Scientology has still not submitted, indeed confessed to, its basic
tenets of creed and practices, the organization has acted in bad faith
from the moment of its first submission.

I remember Judge Sohigian in LA Superior Court in 1992:

[Quote]

There appears to be in the history of [Scientology's] behavior a very,
very substantial deviation between their conduct and standards of
ordinary, courteous conduct and standards of ordinary, honest
behavior. They're just way off in a different firmament.

..it's the kind of behavior which makes you sort of be sure you cut
the deck and be sure you've counted all the cards. If you're having a
friendly poker game you'd make sure to count all the chips before you
dealt any cards.

[End Quote]
http://www.gerryarmstrong.org/50grand/legal/affi-1993-02-17.html

Scientology, consummately, is the Church of Bad Faith.® Its statements
or submissions cannot be expected to not be false.

>98. In the light of the foregoing, the Court considers that the
>interference with the applicant's right to freedom of religion and
>association was not justified.

Interesting. There had not actually been any interference whatsoever
that I had seen. Scientology had simply not been permitted to
re-register because it didn't submit, as required by law, its basic
tenets of creed and practices.

Obviously, the only reason for submitting these things is so that the
authorities can study them, to relate the practices to the creed, and
evaluate them against the common national criminal or civil law codes.

If an authority is not permitted to study and evaluate what an
applicant submits, there would be no reason to require them to submit
anything.

Since just Scientology's Scripture consists of more than half a
million written pages, over 3,000 tape-recorded lectures and some 100
films, any authority to whom this tremendously voluminous Scripture
would be submitted, would need a commensurate amount of time to study
and evaluate that Scripture.

An accurate identification and description of Scientology's practices
would also be very voluminous, and would also require a great deal of
study and evaluation.

There have already been, of course, different national or state
studies of Scientology done over its history, and a wealth of other
documents and evidence available concerning its actual creed and
practices. E.g.,
http://www.xenu.net/archive/audit/andrhome.html
http://www.xenu.net/archive/audit/foster01.html
http://www.gerryarmstrong.org/50grand/media/bw-lfv-rpt-2004.html

> There has therefore been a violation of
>Article 11 of the Convention read in the light of Article 9.

Interesting. They weren't really prevented from doing any of the
activities that Article 11 protects: freedom of peaceful assembly and
freedom of association with others. They were prevented from
re-registering as a religion or religious organization, presumably
because they had not submitted the required documents.

>II. ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLE 14 OF THE CONVENTION, READ IN
>CONJUNCTION WITH ARTICLES 9, 10 AND 11
>99. The applicant further complained under Article 14 of the
>Convention, read in conjunction with Articles 9, 10 and 11, that it had
>been discriminated against on account of its position as a religious
>minority in Russia.

That's certainly not true.

>Article 14 reads as follows:
>“The enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in [the] Convention
>shall be secured without discrimination on any ground such as sex, race,
>colour, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or
>social origin, association with a national minority, property, birth or
>other status.”

Good.

>100. The Court reiterates that Article 14 has no independent existence,
>but plays an important role by complementing the other provisions of the
>Convention and the Protocols, since it protects individuals placed in
>similar situations from any discrimination in the enjoyment of the
>rights set forth in those other provisions. Where a substantive Article
>of the Convention or its Protocols has been invoked both on its own and
>together with Article 14 and a separate breach has been found of the
>substantive Article, it is not generally necessary for the Court to
>consider the case under Article 14 also, though the position is
>otherwise if a clear inequality of treatment in the enjoyment of the
>right in question is a fundamental aspect of the case (see Chassagnou
>and Others v. France [GC], nos. 25088/94, 28331/95 and 28443/95, § 89,
>ECHR 1999-III, and Dudgeon v. the United Kingdom, judgment of 22 October
>1981, Series A no. 45, § 67).
>101. In the circumstances of the present case the Court considers that
>the inequality of treatment, of which the applicant claimed to be a
>victim, has been sufficiently taken into account in the above assessment
>that led to the finding of a violation of substantive Convention
>provisions (see, in particular, paragraph 97 above). It follows that
>there is no cause for a separate examination of the same facts from the
>standpoint of Article 14 of the Convention (see Metropolitan Church of
>Bessarabia, § 134, and Sidiropoulos, § 52, both cited above).

Okay, then the Chamber is dispensing with Scientology's discrimination
claim, without addressing its merits.

>III. APPLICATION OF ARTICLE 41 OF THE CONVENTION
>102. Article 41 of the Convention provides:
>“If the Court finds that there has been a violation of the Convention or
>the Protocols thereto, and if the internal law of the High Contracting
>Party concerned allows only partial reparation to be made, the Court
>shall, if necessary, afford just satisfaction to the injured party.”
>A. Damage
>103. The applicant claimed a global amount of 20,000 euros (“EUR”) in
>respect of pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage incurred through on-going
>uncertainty as to the applicant's legal status, serious disruption of
>its management and activities, diversion of resources to administrative
>matters concerning re-registration and litigation.

That can be a benchmark for Russia's pecuniary and non-pecuniary
damages when the judgment is against Scientology.

>They also requested
>the Court to hold that the respondent State was to secure
>re-registration of the applicant as a religious organisation and issue
>the registration certificate.

No, the ECHR should simply send the case back to Moscow with
instructions to receive Scientology's application, to give it a
thorough and expeditious examination, and to either grant the
application or provide a detailed reason for its refusal.

>104. The Government claimed that the claim was excessive and
>unreasonable. In their view, lawful litigation could not have caused any
>damage.

Correct.

>105. The Court considers that the violation it has found must have
>caused the applicant non-pecuniary damage for which it awards, on an
>equitable basis, EUR 10,000, plus any tax that may be chargeable. It
>rejects the remainder of the applicant's claim for non-pecuniary damage.

I think Russia can look at this as a slap in the face from
Scientology.

>106. As regards the applicant's request for injunctive relief in
>respect of the re-registration of the applicant, the Court is not
>empowered under the Convention to grant exemptions or declarations of
>the kind sought by the applicant, for its judgments are essentially
>declaratory in nature.

Wow! Scientology was seriously pushing its luck. It wanted the ECHR to
*enjoin* Russia to re-register Scientology as a religious entity.

> In general, it is primarily for the State
>concerned to choose the means to be used in its domestic legal order in
>order to discharge its legal obligation under Article 46 of the
>Convention (see Shofman v. Russia, no. 74826/01, § 53, 24 November 2005,
>with further references).

Perhaps conduct an investigation and evidentiary hearing concerning
Scientology's actual creed and practices. The basic documents or basic
starting point is Scientology's Scripture as the organization defines
it.

>By finding a violation of Article 11 read in
>the light of Article 9 in the present case, the Court has established
>the Government's obligation to take appropriate measures to remedy the
>applicant's individual situation (see Fadeyeva v. Russia, no. 55723/00,
>§ 142, ECHR 2005-...). Whether such measures would involve granting
>re-registration to the applicant, removing the requirement to obtain
>re-registration from the Religions Act, re-opening of the domestic
>proceedings or a combination of these and other measures, is a decision
>that falls to the respondent State.

Excellent. For example, a thorough investigation of Scientology's
nature, policies and practices leading to a rejection of the
organization as a legal religious entity.

>The Court, however, emphasises that
>any measures adopted must be compatible with the conclusions set out in
>the Court's judgment (see Assanidze v. Georgia [GC], no. 71503/01, §
>202, ECHR 2004-II, with further references).

Yes, I see no incompatibility between what I've written or suggested
here and the ECHR's conclusions.

>B. Costs and expenses
>107. Relying on documentary evidence, the applicant claimed EUR 142.92
>in court fees and EUR 11,653.93 in legal fees. It also claimed an
>additional amount of EUR 20,000 for outstanding legal fees due under the
>contract with respect to litigation before the domestic courts and the
>Strasbourg proceedings.

For a grand total of EUR 31,796.85.

>108. The Government submitted that only real and necessary expenses
>should be reimbursed.
>109. The Court accepts that the applicant incurred costs and expenses
>in connection with the repeated attempts to secure re-registration and
>domestic and Strasbourg proceedings. The applicant's expenses are
>supported with relevant materials. It considers, however, that the
>amount claimed in respect of outstanding legal fees is excessive and a
>certain reduction must be applied. Having regard to the elements in its
>possession, the Court awards the applicant EUR 15,000 in respect of
>costs and expenses, plus any tax that may be chargeable on that amount.

Peanuts for Scientology, but a significant gloat factor I'd think.

>C. Default interest
>110. The Court considers it appropriate that the default interest
>should be based on the marginal lending rate of the European Central
>Bank, to which should be added three percentage points.
>FOR THESE REASONS, THE COURT UNANIMOUSLY
>1. Holds that the applicant may claim to be a “victim” for the purposes
>of Article 34 of the Convention;

Oh brother, that's so sad.

>
>2. Holds that there has been a violation of Article 11 of the
>Convention read in the light of Article 9;

This calls out for correction.

>
>3. Holds that no separate examination of the same issues under Article
>14 of the Convention is required;

Scientology's religious discrimination claim.

>
>4. Holds
>(a) that the respondent State is to pay the applicant, within three
>months from the date on which the judgment becomes final in accordance
>with Article 44 § 2 of the Convention, the following amounts, to be
>converted into Russian roubles at the rate applicable at the date of the
>settlement,
>(i) EUR 10,000 (ten thousand euros) in respect of non-pecuniary damage;
>(ii) EUR 15,000 (fifteen thousand euros) in respect of costs and
>expenses;

EUR 25,0000 is a figure that may cost Scientology dearly.

>(iii) any tax that may be chargeable on the above amounts;
>(b) that from the expiry of the above-mentioned three months until
>settlement simple interest shall be payable on the above amounts at a
>rate equal to the marginal lending rate of the European Central Bank
>during the default period plus three percentage points;
>
>5. Dismisses the remainder of the applicant's claim for just
>satisfaction.
>Done in English, and notified in writing on 5 April 2007, pursuant to
>Rule 77 §§ 2 and 3 of the Rules of Court.
> Søren Nielsen
>Christos Rozakis
> Registrar
>President
>

I look forward to contacting anyone involved with this decision or
with Scientology's Russian front. I trust that Russia intends to
request reference of this case to the Grand Chamber.

© Gerry Armstrong
http://www.gerryarmstrong.org