Strasbourg Observers

View posts from: Evidence

  • Dmitry Kurnosov

No easy way out: the Strasbourg Court and legacy Russian cases

March 24, 2023

Dmitry Kurnosov Russia’s expulsion from the Council of Europe (‘CoE’) and, consequently, from the European Convention system has left almost 17 thousand cases pending before the European Court of Human Rights (‘ECtHR’, ‘the Court’). That number will rise further as the Court has declared that it will accept applications concerning acts and omissions under Russian […]

  • Anne-Katrin Speck

Russia and the Strasbourg Court: evidentiary challenges arising from Russia’s expulsion from the Council of Europe

June 02, 2022

[This post first appeared on the DISSECT blog.] Introduction It has been three months since Europe woke up to the horrific news that Russia had launched a brutal invasion of neighbouring Ukraine—two months during which Ukraine has seen immeasurable suffering and destruction, and two months which have dramatically changed Europe’s human rights landscape. It is […]

  • Cornelia Klocker

Estemirova v. Russia: A missed opportunity for the protection of human rights defenders

October 08, 2021

By Dr Cornelia Klocker Does the finding of an ineffective investigation and a violation of the duty to cooperate compensate for a non-engagement with the substantive limb of Article 2 ECHR? Natalia Estemirova was one of the most prominent human rights defenders in Chechnya, investigating and documenting cases of enforced disappearances, abductions, torture and extrajudicial […]

  • Dr. Ramute Remezaite

Proving incidents in custody: significance of expert evidence in Lapshin v Azerbaijan

September 28, 2021

By Dr. Ramute Remezaite The significance of evidence in the adjudication of individual human rights complaints by the European Court of Human Rights (Court) is indisputable: the Court will normally rely on the evidence provided by the parties and the facts established in the domestic judicial proceedings. In some instances, such as those relating to […]

  • Guest Blogger

Inadmissibility of evidence obtained by private persons through the use of torture or inhuman or degrading treatment: the case of Ćwik v. Poland

November 27, 2020

Tobias Thienel, associated fellow at the Walther Schücking Institute of International Law at the University of Kiel, Germany, and lawyer with Weissleder Ewer* A classic staple of the cop show genre has the detective ‘roughing up’ a stubborn defendant in order to produce a confession. This somewhat hackneyed story line never had much to do […]