The United Nations Human Rights Committee has found Russia responsible for violating the rights to fair trial and to be free from torture of six Chechen men who were unlawfully detained and tortured, in the North Caucasus region, between September 2004 and February 2005 before being convicted of terrorism related charges. See Human Rights Committee, Taysumov et al. v. Russia,
Read moreThe Russian Federation (Russia) is a Member State of the Council of Europe (COE) and of the United Nations (UN), and has human rights obligations at the regional and universal levels. Regional: European System As a Member of the COE, Russia has ratified the European Convention on Human Rights and is subject to the jurisdiction of the European Court of
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The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has issued its second ever monetary judgment in an inter-State case, ordering Russia to pay the Georgian government 10 million euros as reparations for Russia’s collective expulsion of thousands of Georgian nationals between 2006 and 2007. See ECtHR, Georgia v. Russia (I) [GC], no. 13255/07, ECHR 2019, Judgment of
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On June 20, 2016, a chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) ruled that legislation in Russia banning the promotion of homosexuality, especially to minors, violated three gay activists’ rights to the freedom of expression and the prohibition of discrimination, enshrined in articles 10 and 14, respectively, of the European Convention on Human Rights. See ECtHR, Bayev and
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On October 11, 2016, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) unanimously held that the government of Russia violated the rights of Garri Kasparov, a political activist and well-known chess player, to liberty and security of person and to freedom of assembly under articles 5 and 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights. See ECtHR, Kasparov v. Russia, no.
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The International Criminal Court (ICC) last week authorized the Office of the Prosecutor to investigate alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in South Ossetia from July 1 to October 10, 2008 during the armed conflict between Georgia and Russia. [ICC Press Release] According to the ICC Prosecutor, between 13,400 and 18,500 ethnic Georgians were forcibly displaced and the ethnic Georgian
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On December 4, 2015, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) issued its judgment in the case of Zakharov v. Russia, concerning the compatibility of Russia’s secret surveillance of mobile phone communications with Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights. See ECtHR, Zakharov v. Russia [GC], no. 47143/06, Judgment of 4 December 2015. The case was
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In a new judgment, the European Court of Human Rights has addressed a novel issue in human rights law: whether allowing medical students to observe a childbirth without the mother’s explicit consent violated her right to privacy. [ECtHR Press Release] The applicant, Ms. Yevgeniya Konovalova, argued that the unauthorized presence of medical students during her childbirth unlawfully interfered with her
Read moreOn April 22, the United Nations Human Rights Council’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR) Working Group commenced its sixteenth session in Geneva. During this two-week session, the Council will review and confirm reports on the human rights situation in Turkmenistan, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Colombia, Uzbekistan, Tuvalu, Germany, Djibouti, Canada, Bangladesh, the Russian Federation, Azerbaijan, Cameroon, and Cuba. [UN HRC] The fourteen
Read moreLast week, the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) announced its decision in the case of I.K. v. Austria, app. no. 2964/12, Judgment of 28 March 2013, in which the court considered the conventionality of Austria’s denial of asylum to a Russian national of Chechen origin whose father had worked for former Chechen separatist leader Aslan Maskhadov. The court held, unanimously,
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