The European Court of Human Rights considers it proven: Russia is systematically violating human rights in Crimea. This does not have any immediate consequences – but it is important for later proceedings.
More than 7,400 people from Ukraine have complained about Russia to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg in recent years – because of the annexation of Crimea, the war in eastern Ukraine or the Russian attacks since 2022.
The Ukrainian government has filed four so-called interstate complaints against its neighbouring country. The Grand Chamber of the Court has now ruled on the first of these complaints. It concerned the consequences of the occupation of Crimea, not the question of whether the annexation itself was legal.
An unusually comprehensive judgment
At the oral hearing before the Court last December, Ukraine’s Deputy Minister of Justice Iryna Mudra pointed out that many human rights violations had been documented in Crimea since 2014:
Almost all articles of the European Convention on Human Rights have been violated. And we are trying to show that these are not isolated cases, but that this is part of Russian administrative practice, a pattern that began in Crimea and then spread to other regions of Ukraine.
The 17 judges of the court see it the same way. In their almost 350-page judgment, they write that it was very difficult to clarify the allegations. It involves many people, a long period of time and events in a huge area, in Crimea and in Russia.
In addition, Russia did not help in any way with the investigation. And independent research is not possible in Crimea. But the bottom line is that there was enough evidence for a large number of incidents. One could even speak of a pattern. And Russia is also responsible for this pattern of human rights violations.
Documentation of violence
The judgment from Strasbourg is solely concerned with how Russian troops and paramilitary forces tolerated by Russia have behaved in Crimea since 2014. The court brings together all the complaints: brutal attacks by security forces, torture, disappearances, murders and unlawful detentions.
It also involves the suppression of the Ukrainian language, the persecution of non-Russian media, harassment of all religious communities that were not Russian Orthodox, and the forced naturalization of Ukrainian citizens.
Russia was unable to convince
Russia had only commented in writing in the court proceedings, criticising the accusations as being too vague and pointing out that all measures were covered by the Russian legal system. However, this did not convince the Human Rights Court.
On the contrary, he condemns Russia because it has violated many fundamental rights from the European Convention on Human Rights, not only the right to life or the right to a fair trial. The right to property and the right to private life have also been violated, for example through expropriations or forced naturalization.
The court calls on Russia to return abducted prisoners. Apart from that, there are no other demands on the country, which has since withdrawn from the European Convention on Human Rights. The ruling only states that the question of compensation is still open. The judges’ main aim was apparently to establish how much injustice has occurred in Crimea since 2014.
Judgment could be for others Court proceedings become important
Ukraine’s Deputy Minister of Justice said at the hearing last December that her main concern with the proceedings was to document the facts. And Ukraine can now refer to all of these official findings of the European Court of Justice in proceedings before other international courts.
At the same time, the ruling can serve as a justification for Ukraine’s current defensive struggle, because it describes very precisely what could happen if further parts of Ukraine were handed over to Russia.