06 July 2007, 16:25
"Memorial": European Court's decisions on Chechnya do not reduce the crime count
The judicial system of the European Court for Human Rights is far from being perfect, since it resorts to forcing a respondent-state to pay out compensation. Oleg Orlov, Chairman of the Human Rights Centre (HRC) "Memorial," called this practice the "impunity tax."
According to the statistics presented by Kirill Koroteev, a lawyer of the "Memorial," currently the European Court for Human Rights "keeps hundreds of Chechen cases." Six complaints united into three cases, which were traced by the HRC "Memorial," not long ago were recognized eligible for the European Court.
"In some cases we know, who stands behind these or those offences covered by the Article 'crimes against humanity.' Therefore, if they are not brought to responsibility in Russia, these offenders can be prosecuted in many countries according to the principles of universal jurisdiction," K. Koroteev says.
According to Oleg Orlov, the European Court should investigate cases and punish those guilty. Also it is very important to inform militaries about the norms of international law in the area of human rights: "In order not to have another captain Ulman's situation, when defendants kept asserting that their only 'God' was the military charter. They were ordered to execute people - and they did it."
Author: Alexandra Kondrasheva, CK correspondent
