Information Note on the Court’s case-law 183
March 2015
Akdemir and Evin v. Turkey - 58255/08 and 29725/09
Judgment 17.3.2015 [Section II]
Article 2
Positive obligations
Compensation award in respect of deaths caused by ordnance belonging to army: inadmissible
Facts – The applicants are the mothers of three children involved in an incident in 1999 when a device they had found in a bin near a military zone exploded. Two of the children suffered severe injuries and the other died. The public prosecutor’s office concluded that the death had been caused by the explosion of a bomb planted in the bin by terrorists, who had prepared it using an explosive device originally belonging to the armed forces. The prosecutor’s office issued a permanent search warrant in respect of the perpetrators but discontinued the case in 2009 as the prosecution had become time-barred, observing that despite the ongoing searches, it had not been possible to identify them. After establishing strict liability on the part of the authorities for the explosion, the Supreme Administrative Court upheld the applicants’ claims for damages and awarded them compensation. The total amount paid to the mother of the deceased child was equivalent to EUR 22,172, while the two surviving children received a total award equivalent to EUR 83,739.
Law – Article 2 (substantive aspect): After finding the authorities liable for the explosion, the domestic courts had awarded substantial damages. The amounts awarded were far from insufficient. The fact that the concurrent liability of the child who had found the explosive device had been taken into account in assessing the compensation did not detract from that observation. Accordingly, there was no need for any further examination of whether the national authorities had fulfilled their positive obligation to protect life, seeing that the proceedings in the administrative courts had led to an acknowledgment that the military authorities had been negligent – by breaching their duties deriving from the obligation to protect the lives of others – and to the award of appropriate amounts by way of redress for the damage caused.
Conclusion: inadmissible (manifestly ill-founded).
The Court found, however, that there had been a violation of Article 6 § 1 on account of the length of the administrative proceedings.
(See also Oruk v. Turkey, 33647/04, 4 February 2014, Information Note 171)
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This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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