European Court Starts the Examination of the Case of Georgia versus Russia on the Merits

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Human Rights Center Memorial

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14 jun 2012, 9:34:16 a.m.14/6/12

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European Court Starts the Examination of the Case of Georgia versus Russia on the Merits

Yesterday, on June 13, 2012, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of human rights has started the examination of the case of Georgia versus Russia on the merits. The application concerned the collective expulsion of Georgian population from Russia in autumn of 2006 and in the beginning of 2007 and huge violations of their rights.

The application was lodged with the Court by Georgian government on March 26, 2007. The court declared it admissible on June 30, 2009; witnesses’ statements were taken in January-February of 2011.

In October 2006 after the conflict between Georgian authorities and Russian peacemakers at Abkhazian border, the Georgians were subjected to “hunting” all over Russia. Around a hundred people applied to the Civic Assistance Committee and Human Rights Center Memorial asking to issue certificates to them which would explain the reasons of their stay in Russia and which they could show to the policemen.

On October 17, Memorial and Civic Assistance conducted a press-conference "Anti-Georgian bacchanal and fascistization of the society. Has the president joined the DPNI (The Movement Against Illegal Immigration)?"

On October 18, under the initiative of Svetlana Ganushkina and Tamara Morchakova the Presidential Council on Civil Society and Human Rights of the Russian Federation accepted the statement regarding the events (see the text in Russian: http://www.memo.ru/uploads/files/780.doc). Then, the "hunting" stopped.

On October 20, Svetlana Gannushkina visited the facility where the foreigners were held before being deported. "I saw many people there, most of them were Georgians from Abkhazia. They were simply arrested on the street, put into the buses and taken to the court, - Gannushkina tells. - People often had to stay in the buses while the court issued the judgments on their further expulsion. There were even Georgians - Russian residents among them.

All the detained were told that lodging the appeal on the court’s decision is in vain and that it would only aggravate the situation. I managed to persuade two Georgians - Russian residents to lodge the appeals. Of course, we won the cases and people stayed in Russia" (see the text of the reference composed after the visit to the facility; in Russian: http://www.memo.ru/uploads/files/781.doc).

Those who did not venture to lodge the appeals were expelled. It's known that at least two people died in deportation facilities during the campaign: Manana Dzhabelia died when the decision on her release had been already issued; an elderly man died during the deportation.

In course of the “hunting” of the Georgians MIA sent the secret directive to the schools and universities requesting the information about Georgian children and students who were studying there (see, for example, report about the fact that UBOP sent to Tomsky state university the request to share information about Georgian students, in Russian: http://www.spravda.ru/news/3166.html). Human rights defenders got the request from the indignant workers of one of the universities.

"It's obvious that this campaign was initiated from above, - Gannushkina says, - which is proved, primary, by the directives issued by the MIA and which we’ve obtained. Moreover, in 2008 when the conflict between Russia and Georgia was much more serious nevertheless the "hunting" of the Georgians did not reproduce. However, an excessive act has occurred to one of our clients. He was taken to the police. We called there and they answered: "We release him for this time because we don't have such a directive for this moment."

"Georgia asked us to share our information with them, and we did, and now we are waiting for the ruling," - Gannushkina says.

Unfortunately, it's not a single case when Russian government in response to the aggravation of the relations with a country starts to persecute and deport its residents. For instance, last year the same happened to Tajikistan residents when Russian pilot Sadovnichii was detained in Dushanbe. As a result, the pilot has been released but the decision of deportation has not been canceled (http://www.memo.ru/eng/news/2011/11/22/2211111.html).

We would like to remind that according to Article 4 of the Additional Protocol 4 to the European Convention collective expulsion of aliens from the territory of the country - participant of the Convention is prohibited. Moreover, according to the practice of the European Court the decision of expulsion must be issued regarding every single case with detailed examination of the facts of the matter.