European Court of Human Rights

FIRST SECTION

DECISION

Application no. 38738/07
by Vyacheslav Vasilyevich KUZNETSOV

and 4 other applications

(nos. 38742/07, 38743/07, 39439/07 and 39441/07)

against Russia

The European Court of Human Rights (First Section), sitting on 25 November 2010 as a Chamber composed of:

Christos Rozakis, President,
Nina Vajić,
Anatoly Kovler,
Elisabeth Steiner,
Khanlar Hajiyev,
Giorgio Malinverni,
George Nicolaou, judges,
and Søren Nielsen, Section Registrar,

Having regard to the above applications,

Having regard to the decision to apply the pilot-judgment procedure taken in the case of Burdov (no. 2) v. Russia (no. 33509/04, ECHR 2009-...),

Having regard to the declarations submitted by the respondent Government requesting the Court to strike the applications out of the list of case and the applicants’ positive replies to those declarations,

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

THE FACTS

The applicants are five Russian nationals whose names and years of birth are tabulated below. The Russian Government (“the Government”) were represented by Mr G. Matyushkin, the Representative of the Russian Federation at the European Court of Human Rights.

The facts of the case, as submitted by the parties, may be summarised as follows.

The applicants sued the State authorities in domestic courts. The courts held for the applicants and ordered the State to pay for the cars to be given to the applicants. These judgments became binding but the authorities delayed their enforcement.

COMPLAINTS

The applicants complained under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 about the delayed enforcement of the judgments in their favour.

THE LAW

Following the Burdov (no. 2) pilot judgment, cited above, the Government informed the Court of the payment of the domestic court awards in the applicants’ favour and submitted unilateral declarations aimed at resolving the issues raised by the applications. By these declarations the Russian authorities acknowledged excessive duration of the enforcement of the domestic judgments in the applicants’ favour. They declared that they were ready to pay each of the applicants ex gratia EUR 5,500. The remainder of the declarations read as follows:

“The authorities therefore invite the Court to strike [the applications] out of the list of cases. They suggest that the present declaration might be accepted by the Court as “any other reason” justifying the striking out of the case of the Court’s list of cases, as referred to in Article 37 § 1 (c) of the Convention.

The [sum indicated above], which [are] to cover any pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage as well as costs and expenses, will be free of any taxes that may be applicable. [They] will be payable within three months from the date of notification of the decision taken by the Court pursuant to Article 37 § 1 of the European Convention on Human Rights. In the event of failure to pay [these sums] within the said three-month period, the Government undertake to pay simple interest on [them] from expiry of that period until settlement, at a rate equal to the marginal lending rate of the European Central Bank during the default period plus three percentage points.

This payment will constitute the final resolution of the case.”

The applicants agreed to the terms of the Government’s declarations.

The Court reiterates that Article 37 § 1 (c) of the Convention enables it to strike a case out of its list if:

“for any other reason established by the Court, it is no longer justified to continue the examination of the application.”

Article 37 § 1 in fine states:

“However, the Court shall continue the examination of the application if respect for human rights as defined in the Convention and the protocols thereto so requires.”

The Court recalls that in its pilot judgment (Burdov v. Russia (no. 2), cited above, § 145) it recently ordered the Russian Federation to

“grant [adequate and sufficient] redress, within one year from the date on which the judgment [became] final, to all victims of non-payment or unreasonably delayed payment by State authorities of a judgment debt in their favour who [had] lodged their applications with the Court before the delivery of the present judgment and whose applications [had been] communicated to the Government under Rule 54 § 2 (b) of the Rules of the Court.”

Having examined the terms of the Government’s declarations concerning the present applications, the Court understands them as intending to give the applicants redress in line with the pilot judgment (see Burdov (no. 2), cited above, §§ 127 and 145 and point 7 of the operative part).

The Court is satisfied that the excessive length of the execution of judgments in the applicants’ favour is explicitly acknowledged by the Government. It also notes that the compensations offered are comparable with Court awards in similar cases (see Burdov (no. 2), cited above, §§ 99 and 154).

The Court therefore considers that it is no longer justified to continue the examination of the applications. It is also satisfied that respect for human rights as defined in the Convention and the protocols thereto does not require it to continue the examination of the applications.

Accordingly, the present applications should be struck out of the Court’s list of cases.

As regards the question of implementation of the Government’s undertakings, the Committee of Ministers remains competent to supervise this matter in accordance with Article 46 of the Convention (see the Committee’s decisions of 14-15 September 2009 (CM/Del/Dec(2009)1065) and Interim Resolution CM/ResDH(2009)1 58 concerning the implementation of the Burdov (no. 2) judgment). In any event the Court’s present ruling is without prejudice to any decision it might take to restore, pursuant to Article 37 § 2 of the Convention, the present applications to the list of cases (see E.G. v. Poland (dec.), no. 50425/99, § 29, ECHR 2008 ... (extracts)).

For these reasons, the Court unanimously

Decides to join the applications;

Decides to strike the applications out of its list of cases in accordance with Article 37 § 1 (c) of the Convention.

Søren Nielsen Christos Rozakis
Registrar President

ANNEX