CASE OF BILKO AND OTHERS v. UKRAINE

FIFTH SECTION

CASE OF BILKO AND OTHERS v. UKRAINE

(Application no. 35442/13)

JUDGMENT
 

STRASBOURG

23 October 2025

This judgment is final but it may be subject to editorial revision.

In the case of Bilko and Others v. Ukraine,

The European Court of Human Rights (Fifth Section), sitting as a Committee composed of:

 Kateřina Šimáčková, President,
 María Elósegui,
 Gilberto Felici, judges,
and Martina Keller, Deputy Section Registrar,

Having regard to:

the application (no. 35442/13) against Ukraine lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 20 May 2013 by three Ukrainian nationals (“the applicants”), whose relevant details are listed in the appended table;

the decision to give notice of the applicants’ complaint concerning the annulment of their titles to property to the Ukrainian Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, most recently Ms Marharyta Sokorenko, and to declare the remainder of the application inadmissible;

the parties’ observations;

Having deliberated in private on 25 September 2025,

Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

1.  The present case concerns a deprivation of the applicants’ titles to their plots of land as a result of the court proceedings instituted against them by a prosecutor. They complained under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention.

2.  By decisions adopted between 18 October and 2 November 2001 and on 27 April 2004, the Gostomel Village Council (“the Council”) decided to provide the applicants, as persons who had suffered from the Chernobyl disaster and had been evacuated from the radioactively polluted territory, with plots of land to be allotted from the Council’s land reserve fund. On 9 August and 22 December 2005 the applicants each received from the State a deed of title to a plot of land measuring 3.2277 ha.

3.  In February 2012 a local prosecutor, acting in the interests of a local land authority, lodged a civil claim with the Irpin Town Court against the Council and the applicants, seeking the invalidation of the above decisions and deeds of titles. He argued, inter alia, that the plots of land transferred to the applicants had been earlier transferred for permanent use to agricultural company B.

4.  On 28 May 2012 the court rejected the claim. It found, in particular, that the 2001 and 2004 decisions had not specified the locations of the disputed plots, therefore there were no grounds to consider that they had been allocated to the applicants from company B.’s land.

5.  On 3 October 2012, following appeals by the prosecutor and company P. (allegedly company B.’s successor), the Kyiv Regional Court of Appeal overturned the judgment of 28 May 2012 and recognised company B.’s rights to the disputed plots of land. It held that the lower court’s finding that the 2001 and 2004 decisions had not specified the location of the plots of land had been wrong: as confirmed by technical documents, the plots allocated to the applicants had been located on land previously transferred to company B., which on 10 May 2000 had received from the State a deed of title confirming its right of permanent use of that land. That deed had not been invalidated and there was no information indicating that company B.’s right of permanent use of the plots of land had been terminated.

6.  On 21 November 2012 the Higher Specialised Civil and Criminal Court upheld the judgment of 3 October 2012.

7.  On 16 September 2016 the Council allocated a plot of land measuring 0.1 ha to the second applicant.

8.  On 16 December 2020 the Court gave notice of the application to the Government, asking them to provide observations on the subject matter. It instructed the applicants to appoint a representative.

9.  On 27 August 2021 the Government submitted their observations.

10.  By a letter of 23 September 2021, the Court again invited the applicants to appoint a representative.

11.  On 27 May 2024 the applicants sent a letter to the Court confirming their intent to pursue their complaints.

12.  By a letter of 18 June 2024, the Registry repeated their request for the applicants to appoint a representative.

13.  On 13 August 2024 the Court received a letter from the first and third applicants, who confirmed their interest in pursuing the case, but reported difficulties in appointing a representative.

14.  By a letter of 25 September 2024, sent via eComms, the applicants were invited to reply to the Government’s observations. They were informed of a decision to grant them leave to represent their case in the proceedings before the Court. The applicants did not download that letter.

15.  On 7 November 2024 the Court sent the above-mentioned letter, with the Government’s observations enclosed, to the applicants by post and by registered mail with acknowledgment of receipt. In the Court’s letters of 18 June, 25 September and 7 November 2024, the applicants’ attention was drawn to Article 37 § 1 (a) of the Convention, which provides that the Court may strike an application out of its list of cases where the circumstances lead to the conclusion that the applicant does not intend to pursue the application.

16.  On 6 December 2024 the first and the third applicants replied to the Government’s observations.

THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT

17.  The Court notes at the outset that the third applicant died after lodging the application and that her daughter, Ms Galyna Petrivna Klochenok, has expressed her wish to continue the proceedings before it. The Government have not objected. Having regard to the circumstances of the present case, the Court accepts that the applicant’s daughter has a legitimate interest in pursuing the application in her mother’s stead. For practical reasons, it will continue to refer to Ms Varvara Mykhaylivna Kozyrenko as the third applicant (see, for example, Tagiyev and Huseynov v. Azerbaijan, no. 13274/08, §§ 23 and 24, 5 December 2019, with further references).

18.  The Court further notes that the second applicant did not reply to the Court’s letters asking the applicants to appoint a representative (see paragraph 13 above) and the invitation to provide his reply to the Government’s observations (see paragraph 16 above).

19.  In these circumstances, the Court considers that the second applicant may be regarded as no longer wishing to pursue his complaint (Article 37 § 1 (a) of the Convention). Furthermore, in accordance with Article 37 § 1 in fine, the Court finds no special circumstances regarding respect for human rights as defined in the Convention and its Protocols which require the continued examination of the case. Accordingly, it decides to strike the part of the application in respect of the second applicant out of its list.

20.  The first and third applicants complained that they had been deprived of their property as a result of the court proceedings instituted against them.

21.  The Government argued that the applicants had failed to exhaust domestic remedies in that they had failed to either reapply to the Council and seek the allocation of new plots of land or appeal against its decision not to allocate new plots of land.

22.  The Court reiterates that the existence of a remedy that might allow an applicant to obtain damages but does not lead to a reinstatement of title shall be taken into account, not in the context of exhaustion of domestic remedies, but for the purposes of assessing the proportionality of the interference and the calculation of pecuniary damage if a violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention is found (see, for instance, Batkivska Turbota Foundation v. Ukraine, no. 5876/15, § 47, 9 October 2018). Furthermore, the Court does not agree with the Government’s submission that the applicants could have lodged new applications with the Council seeking the allocation of different plots of land, as they did not demonstrate that comparable plots of land had been available (see Nadtochiy v. Ukraine [Committee], no. 32899/13, § 13, 20 September 2022). Consequently, the Government’s objection in relation to non-exhaustion of domestic remedies should be dismissed.

23.  The Court notes that the complaint of the first and third applicants is not manifestly ill-founded within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 (a) of the Convention or inadmissible on any other grounds. It must therefore be declared admissible.

24.  The general principles concerning the deprivation of property can be found in Drozdyk and Mikula v. Ukraine (nos. 27849/15 and 33358/15, § 48, 24 October 2024).

25.  The parties agreed that there had been an interference with the applicants’ possessions. The Court must examine whether the interference was lawful, pursued a general interest and was proportionate (see, for instance, Kryvenkyy v. Ukraine, no. 43768/07, § 42, 16 February 2017).

26.  The Court notes that the interference had a basis in the national law. Furthermore, it concurs with the Government’s argument that the interference pursued a legitimate aim, namely to restore legal certainty and to protect the other company’s rights for the permanent use of its plots of land.

27.  It is to be examined whether the interference had been proportionate. The Court observes that the applicants acquired the land in good faith without having knowledge that the Council had transferred to them land that had already been in use by company B. The applicants should not have had to bear all the negative consequences for the mistake committed by the Council, without any compensation or other type of appropriate reparation (see Tomina and Others v. Russia, nos. 20578/08 and 19 others, § 39, 1 December 2016). Moreover, although the “good governance” principle may require the authorities to act promptly in correcting their mistakes, it also imposes an obligation of payment of adequate compensation to the good-faith owners (see Kryvenkyy, § 45, and Drozdyk and Mikula, § 48, both cited above). The Court has not accepted the Government’s assertion that the applicants had a genuine opportunity to request the Council to have allocated new plots of land to compensate for those which had been taken from them (see paragraph 22 above). Nor did the Government claim that the applicants could claim damages in that respect (compare to Drozdyk and Mikula, § 49, cited above). The Court therefore considers that the lack of any compensation for the dispossessed plots of land imposed a disproportionate burden on the applicants, which led to a violation of their right to the peaceful enjoyment of their possessions.

28.  There has accordingly been a violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. l to the Convention.

APPLICATION OF ARTICLE 41 OF THE CONVENTION

29.  The applicants did not submit a claim for just satisfaction. Accordingly, the Court considers that there is no call to award them any sum on that account.

FOR THESE REASONS, THE COURT, UNANIMOUSLY,

Done in English, and notified in writing on 23 October 2025, pursuant to Rule 77 §§ 2 and 3 of the Rules of Court.

 Martina Keller Kateřina Šimáčková
 Deputy Registrar President

APPENDIX

List of applicants:

No.

Applicant’s name

Year of

 birth

Nationality

Place of residence

1.

Antonina Vasylivna BILKO

1962

Ukrainian

Gostomel

2.

Oleksiy Pavlovych BOYKO

1938

Ukrainian

Gostomel

3.

Varvara Mykhaylivna KOZYRENKO

1931

Ukrainian

Gostomel