Legal summary
October 2023
Asgarova and Veselova v. Armenia (dec.) - 24382/15
Decision 12.9.2023 [Section IV]
Article 34
Locus standi
Lack of exceptional circumstances allowing applicants to lodge the application in the name and on behalf of their partners without written authority: inadmissible
Facts – In July 2014 the first applicant’s long-term partner and the second applicant’s husband were arrested after travelling to Kalbajar District, which formed part of the territories surrounding the unrecognised “Nagorno-Karabakh Republic” (“NKR”) and at the time was under the effective control of Armenia (Chiragov and Others v. Armenia [GC]). They were tried, convicted of illegal border crossing, illegal possession of arms, espionage, kidnapping and murder and sentenced to life imprisonment and twenty-two years’ imprisonment respectively. Relying on various articles of the Convention, the applicants complained about the detention of their partners and the ensuing criminal proceedings in the “NKR”. In December 2020 their partners were released and returned to Azerbaijan.
Law – The applicants did not claim to be themselves victims but had lodged the present application on behalf of their partners, the direct victims of the alleged violations. They had not provided any written authority to act on their partners behalf but had argued that exceptional circumstances justified their standing to lodge an application.
The Court reiterated that if an application was not lodged by the victims himself or herself, Rule 45 § 3 of the Rules of Court required the production of a duly signed written authority to act. A third party might, in exceptional circumstances, act in the name and on behalf of a vulnerable person without a duly signed written authority to act where the following two main criteria were satisfied: the risk that the direct victim would be deprived of effective protection of his or her Convention rights, and the absence of a conflict of interests between the victim and the applicant. The list of factors capable of rendering a person vulnerable as set out in Lambert and Others v. France [GC] – “on account of his or her age, sex or disability” – was not exhaustive.
The applicants had argued that their partners had been vulnerable because they had been detained in complete isolation. The Court accepted that a detainee held incommunicado might be regarded as a vulnerable person who was at risk of being deprived of the effective protection of his or her rights. However, despite restrictions on their partners contact with the outside world, the Court was not convinced that the two men had been detained in complete isolation. The International Committee of the Red Cross had on several occasions visited them and had forwarded letters to their families. In one such letter the first applicant’s partner had asked his family to “submit a request to the Office of the UNHCR for a meeting”. However, the applicants had not explained why their partners had never requested them to apply to the Court on their behalf. Moreover, though it had not been disputed that the two men had been visited by representatives of the International Working Group on Search for Missing Persons and Hostages, which consisted of representatives of civil society from different countries, the applicants had failed to substantiate why their partners had not given authority to that organisation to apply to the Court or had asked them to pass on such authority to their families or to the lawyers of their choice.
Accordingly, the applicants had not convincingly shown that their partners had not had a real opportunity to appoint a representative, either by requesting the applicants to apply to the Court on their behalf or by signing an authority form enabling their relatives or the above-mentioned organisation to lodge an application with the Court. No exceptional circumstances could be discerned allowing the applicants to act in the name and on behalf of their partners without a duly signed written authority. Therefore, the applicants did not have standing to lodge the application.
Conclusion: inadmissible (incompatible ratione personae).
(See also Lambert and Others v. France [GC], 46043/14, 5 June 2015, Legal Summary; Chiragov and Others v. Armenia [GC], 13216/05, 16 June 2015, Legal Summary; H.F. and Others v. France [GC], 24384/19 and 44234/20, 14 September 2022, Legal Summary; Ghazaryan and Bayramyan v. Azerbaijan, 33050/18, 5 October 2023, Legal Summary)
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This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.
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