Ryabikin v Russia

Facts

The applicant is a citizen of Turkmenistan and of Russian ethnic origin. He argued that from May 2000 he was threatened by Turkmen law-enforcement bodies and feared for his life in Turkmenistan after alleging that Turkmen Ministry of Finance officials had demanded bribes from his company. In June 2001 he moved to St Petersburg having been granted permission to repatriate by the Russian authorities. After failing to gain Russian citizenship, he applied for refugee status. This was rejected and he was subsequently arrested for extradition to Turkmenistan on charges of alleged embezzlement. He made numerous appeals in Russia both against the rejection of his refugee application and his arrest. He then appealed to the ECtHR under Arts. 3 and 5.

Judgment

On 19 June 2008, the ECtHR held that there would be a violation of Art. 3 if the applicant were to be extradited to Turkmenistan as the charge against him carried a prison sentence of eight to ten years and that diplomatic assurances for his safety should be questioned where there are reliable reports of practices which are “manifestly contrary” to the principles of the ECHR. Furthermore, the conditions of his detention and his vulnerable situation as a minority would place him at real risk of treatment in breach of Art. 3.

In consideration of Art. 5(1)(f), the ECtHR noted a failure in Russian law making it impossible to identify the authorising body responsible for the detention, to highlight the applicable legal provisions or to determine the time-limits of the detention, amounting to a subsequent breach of his right. With regards to Art. 5(4), it held that a respondent State must provide a “certain, accessible and effective” judicial remedy and due to the unavailability of a judicial remedy to review the lawfulness of the applicant’s continued detention, there had been a violation. The applicant was awarded with 15,000 EUR in damages.

Comment

This case highlighted the ECtHR’s careful approach when considering the likelihood of state adherence to diplomatic assurances when dealing with the prevention of human rights violations, especially in consideration of international standards on the prohibition of torture. The ECtHR noted the need for objective monitoring where there is evidence and consistent reporting from independent international human rights protection associations detailing breaches of the ECHR. It also repeated its criticism of Russia’s domestic law concerning detention pending extradition.

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The above admissibility decision and judgment are taken from the website of the European Court of Human Rights http://www.echr.coe.int/ and can be accessed via HUDOC on the court's website: http://cmiskp.echr.coe.int/tkp197/default.htm

The Court's case-law is also collated in Reports of Judgments and Decisions, published by Carl Heymanns Verlag KG.