KIKABIDZE v. GEORGIA AND RUSSIA and 4 other applications

Published on 10 June 2025

SECOND SECTION

Application no. 25112/07
Anguli KIKABIDZE and Tsiala KIKABIDZE against Georgia and Russia
and 4 other applications
(see list appended)
communicated on 19 May 2025

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

The applications concern complaints related to properties situated in Abkhazia, Georgia.

The applicants in applications nos. 25112/07, 50623/07 and 45073/19 are Georgian nationals, who complain primarily that they have had to leave their properties behind in Abkhazia, Georgia after hostilities began there in 1992‑1993 and that they could not peacefully enjoy them ever since.

The applicants in applications nos. 60335/11 and 31741/18 are Russian nationals, who inherited properties in Abkhazia from their Russian relatives.

The main issues raised by all applicants pertain to the rights to enjoy one’s property and home, under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention and Article 8 of the Convention. Some of the applicants raised further complaints under Articles 6 § 1, 13 and 14 of the Convention and Article 2 of Protocol No. 4 to the Convention (see the questions to the parties).

The applicants are husband and wife who used to live in a house in Gagra, Abkhazia for many years in the second half of the twentieth century. The house had been built by the first applicant before the applicants married in 1974. In 1992 the first applicant fled Abkhazia after the onset of the armed conflict, fearing for his life.

The second applicant remained in Abkhazia, residing there throughout the 1990s and at least until the mid-2000s. While it would appear that she slept at her neighbours’ dwelling, she had managed to repair a room in her family’s house and visited it daily, tending to the yard and growing vegetables and fruits. On 18 January 2004 she witnessed unknown individuals moving into the yard and house, having uprooted trees beforehand, and ultimately destroying the house.

In May 2005 the UNOMIG’s Office, which she had approached for assistance, informed her that the Abkhaz de facto administration had issued an order in 2003 regarding the house. The order stated that, since the house had been seriously damaged in 1993 and had not been restored by its occupants, it was considered destroyed and the plot on which it stood was deemed vacant. Consequently, the plot was assigned to two Abkhaz individuals for the purpose of them building houses for themselves.

The second applicant contacted various de facto authorities in Abkhazia, seeking assistance to restore her property rights. On 6 October 2005 the de facto Gagra District Court ruled that she had no legal standing to file a claim regarding the house since, according to the available records, the house solely belonged to her husband. The last response she received was on 8 September 2006, from the de facto Gagra District Prosecutor’s Office, which informed her that her husband, being the previous owner of the house who had left Abkhazia in 1992, needed to turn to a commission for refugees under the Abkhaz “council of ministers”.

The applicants complain in particular that their property rights have been breached as a result of their forced eviction in the early 1990s and continued inability to use and/or dispose of their property.

The applicant moved to Sukhumi after her marriage in 1977. According to her, she and her husband had purchased two flats in Sukhumi in 1986 and 1991, respectively. She provided the specific address and numbers of both flats.

She claims that she fled Abkhazia in a rush after the armed conflict had broken out, leaving behind most of the documents related to the properties. She has been living in Tbilisi since 1997 and has held the status of an internally displaced person since 1993. Her husband died in 2002.

The applicant claims that one of her flats has been occupied by individuals of Abkhaz ethnicity, while the other has been occupied by a person of Russian nationality.

The applicant complains in particular that her property rights have been breached as a result of her forced eviction in the early 1990s and continued inability to return to her properties and use and/or dispose of them.

The applicant claims that he owns property in Sukhumi, and in 2007 inherited another property in Gulripshi, Abkhazia, Georgia from his mother.

Since leaving Abkhazia in the early 1990s, the applicant has sought redress in relation to his property through various courts and authorities in Georgia, without success. After 2014 he also approached courts and authorities in Russia, again without success.

The applicant complains in particular that his property rights have been breached as a result of his forced eviction in the early 1990s and continued inability to return to his properties and use and/or dispose of them.

The applicants allege that the properties which they inherited were allocated by the local de facto Abkhaz administration to private individuals. Despite pursuing proceedings before the de facto Abkhaz courts, which resulted in a favourable outcome for some of the applicants, they had been unable to recover their properties in practice.

There are three applicants in application no. 60335/11.

(a)  The first applicant inherited from his mother two rooms in a house in Sukhumi in 2003. At some point he learned that the de facto local Housing Department had issued an order in March 2004 allocating his rooms to a private individual, Y. In July 2004 the de facto local Housing Department initiated proceedings before the de facto Sukhumi City Court to annul its own order of March 2004. The applicant joined these proceedings in 2008, requesting the de facto court to annul the order and to evict Y. The de facto Supreme Court indefinitely stayed the proceedings, citing a 2006 decree of the de facto Abkhaz Parliament. This decree mandated courts to: (1) cease accepting claims related to property abandoned in Abkhazia before, during or after the 1992-93 conflict; (2) suspend such property-related proceedings; and (3) suspend enforcement of judgments already adopted in this category of cases.

(b)  The second applicant inherited a flat in Sukhumi from her husband in 1997. The flat was allocated to a private individual, Z., in 2005 under a social housing order of the de facto local Housing Department. In 2007 the de facto Sukhumi City Court declared the flat vacant following the local administration’s application to that effect. Z. sold the flat to M. in 2008.

The applicant brought supervisory review proceedings before the de facto courts, leading the de facto Supreme Court to quash the 2007 judgment in a decision of September 2008 and to remit the case for a new examination. The de facto Sukhumi City Court terminated the proceedings in 2009 without delivering a decision on the merits.

Subsequently, the applicant sued M., seeking repossession of the flat. The de facto Sukhumi City Court granted her claim in May 2011. In August 2011 the de facto Supreme Court upheld that judgment in full.

Despite the final judgment in her favour, the applicant claims she has been unable to repossess her flat, not least because of the 2006 decree of the Abkhaz Parliament (see above for more detail).

In 2011 she applied to the Property Commission set up in 2010 to deal with property claims of Russian nationals in Abkhazia, Georgia. On 15 March 2011 the commission acknowledged her rights to her flat but directed her to apply to the courts for confirmation.

(c)  The third applicant inherited a flat in Sukhumi from her husband in 2008. The local de facto Housing Department had issued an order in 2007 allocating the flat to a private individual, W., who has lived in the flat ever since. Prior to that, in September 2006, the de facto Sukhumi City Court had granted the de facto Housing Department’s claim which had sought to declare the flat vacant and to register it as municipal property.

The applicant brought supervisory review proceedings in respect of the de facto Sukhumi City Court’s judgment. In August 2008 the de facto Supreme Court quashed the lower de facto court’s judgment and remitted the case for a new examination. In January 2010 the de facto Sukhumi City Court upheld the de facto Housing Department’s claim.

Following a new set of supervisory review proceedings brought by the applicant, in a judgment of December 2010 the de facto Supreme Court quashed the lower judgment. It found that the applicant was the owner of the flat and annulled the de facto Housing Department’s related order.

Subsequently, the applicant filed a claim in court, seeking to evict W. The de facto Sukhumi City Court delivered a judgment on 6 April 2011, ordering W’s eviction.

According to the applicant, the judgment of 6 April 2011 became final but remains unenforced not least because of the 2006 decree of the Abkhaz Parliament (see above for more detail).

(d)  Facts common to all three applicants

The applicants, assisted by a Moscow-based NGO, applied to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, seeking its intervention in their favour. In late 2009 the Ministry replied that it had transferred their request to the Embassy of the Russian Federation in Abkhazia which was looking for a solution.

The applicants applied to the Presnenskiy District Court in Moscow, challenging the Ministry’s failure to act on their cases. They claimed that this had been in breach of their rights under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention. In July 2010 the court rejected their claims, ruling that Abkhazia was a sovereign state in whose affairs the Ministry could not intervene. Following an appeal by the applicants, in March 2011 the Moscow City Court upheld the reasoning of the lower court’s judgment.

The applicants complain in particular that, despite being owners of their respective properties and despite the adoption of final judicial decisions in favour of the second and third applicants, they have been unable to evict the private individuals who had occupied their property. As regards the first applicant, he complains that he had been unable to have his title to the property recognised by the de facto courts only as a result of the legislative intervention in the pending judicial proceedings which he had initiated.

The applicant in application no. 31741/18 inherited a flat in Gagra from her father in 2008.

In 2016 she initiated a first set of proceedings before a de facto court in Gagra, challenging an order issued in 2001 by the de facto Housing Department which had declared her flat vacant and allocated it to a private individual, X. In a judgment of October 2017 the de facto Supreme Court of Abkhazia upheld the applicant’s claim, overturning the lower court’s judgment. Following supervisory review proceedings, in a final judgment of 29 December 2017 the de facto Supreme Court quashed its earlier judgment in the applicant’s favour and confirmed instead the lower court’s judgment which had refused to declare the 2001 order unlawful and to annul it.

In a second set of proceedings brought by the applicant against X, in which she had sought X’s eviction, the de facto Gagra District Court rejected her claim. The de facto court granted instead X’s counter claim, recognising his right to ownership of the flat based on adverse possession, concluding that he had lived in the flat since the early 1990s. The de facto Supreme Court upheld this in a final judgment of 26 June 2018.

The applicant complains in particular that her property rights have been breached as a result of (a) the order of the de facto Housing Department authorities as confirmed by the final judgment of 29 December 2017; and (b) the final judicial decision of 26 June 2018 confirming the property rights of X in respect of the flat which the applicant claims is her own.

QUESTIONS TO THE PARTIES

1.  Do/did the applicants come within the jurisdiction of Georgia and/or Russia within the meaning of Article 1 of the Convention (see Mamasakhlisi and Others v. Georgia and Russia, nos. 29999/04 and 41424/04, §§ 288-340, 7 March 2023, and Taganova and Others v. Georgia and Russia, no. 18102/04 and 4 other applications, §§ 167 and 177 ss., 17 December 2024), on account of the circumstances of the present cases?

2.  Did the applicants have at their disposal effective remedies in respect of their complaints and did the applicants exhaust these remedies, as required by Article 35 § 1 of the Convention (see Demopoulos and Others v. Turkey (dec.) [GC], nos. 46113/99 and others, §§ 69-70, ECHR 2010)?

3.  Did the applicants lodge their complaints within the six-month period as required by Article 35 § 1 of the Convention (see Taganova and Others, cited above, § 225)?

4.  Have the applicants been able to peacefully enjoy their possessions within the meaning of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention? If not, was any interference with their peaceful enjoyment carried out in accordance with the requirements of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (see Taganova and Others, cited above, §§ 257 ss.; see also, in respect of application no. 31741/18, Stolyarova v. Russia, no. 15711/13, §§ 44-51, 29 January 2015, Vulakh and Others v. Russia, no. 33468/03, § 44, 10 January 2012 and Rustavi 2 Broadcasting Company Ltd and Others v. Georgia, no. 16812/17, § 310, 18 July 2019; see, mutatis mutandis, in respect of the first applicant in application no. 60335/11, Beyeler v. Italy [GC], no. 33202/96, § 114, ECHR 2000-I and Paukštis v. Lithuania, no. 17467/07, § 84, 24 November 2015, and see in respect of the second and third applicants in application no. 60335/11 Burdov v. Russia (no. 2), no. 33509/04, § 65, ECHR 2009 and, mutatis mutandis, Gerasimov and Others v. Russia, nos. 29920/05 and 10 others, §§ 182-83, 1 July 2014)? If there was no interference, did the authorities comply with their related positive obligations under that Convention provision?

The applicants in all applications are invited to submit to the Court any documents related to any developments in their applications, if developments have taken place (such as further proceedings before any authority).

The second applicant in application no. 25112/07 is invited to submit to the Court any documents she might have showing whether she is/was the owner of the property in question (or of a part of it).

The applicant in application no. 50623/07 is invited to submit to the Court any documents she might have showing her property rights in respect of the flats at issue in her application.

The applicants in application no. 60335/11 are invited to submit information about any developments that might have taken place in relation to the proceedings before the de facto courts as regards the first applicant, and the enforcement of the judgments in the second and third applicants’ favour.

5.  In respect of the applicants in applications nos. 25112/07, 50623/07 and 45073/19 has there been a violation of their right to respect for their family life and home, contrary to Article 8 of the Convention (see Taganova and Others, cited above, §§ 365 ss.)?

6.  In respect of the applicants in applications nos. 25112/07, 50623/07 and 45073/19 have they suffered discrimination in the enjoyment of their Convention rights on the ground of their ethnic origin, contrary to Article 14 of the Convention read in conjunction with Article 8 of the Convention and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention (see Taganova and Others, cited above, §§ 386 ss.)?

7.  In application no. 50623/07, has there been a breach of the applicant’s right to freedom of movement under Article 2 of Protocol No. 4 to the Convention, as a result of her inability to return to her home (see Georgia v. Russia (II) [GC], no. 38263/08, §§ 296-301, 21 January 2021)?

8.  In respect of the first applicant in application no. 60335/11, has there been violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention as a result of the intervention of the de facto legislative authorities in the pending proceedings before the de facto courts, to which the de facto authorities were party, and which intervention negatively affected the outcome of those proceedings (see, among other authorities, Zielinski and Pradal and Gonzalez and Others v. France [GC], nos. 24846/94 and 9 others, §§ 57‑61, ECHR 1999-VII)?

9. In respect of the second and third applicants in application no. 60335/11, has there been a violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention as a result of the impossibility for the applicants to have the judgments in their favour delivered by the de facto courts enforced (see Burdov v. Russia (no. 2), no. 33509/04, § 65, ECHR 2009)?

10.  Have the applicants in application no. 60335/11 suffered discrimination in the enjoyment of their rights under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention on the basis of their ethnicity, in breach of Article 14 of the Convention in conjunction with Article 6 § 1 (see, mutatis mutandis, Taganova and Others, cited above,§§ 386 ss.)?

11.  In respect of the applicant in application no. 31741/18, has there been a violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention as a result of the applicant not having had a fair trial in the two sets of judicial proceedings she had brought before the de facto courts (see Mamasakhlisi and Others, cited above,§§ 435 ss.), specifically because: (1) the final judgment in the applicant’s favour in the first set of proceedings was overturned following supervisory review proceedings; (2) the courts in both sets of proceedings wrongly applied the law and ignored evidence; and, (3) the length of both sets of proceedings was excessive?

12.  In respect of the applicant in application no. 45073/19, has there been a violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention as a result of the applicant not having had a fair trial in the proceedings before the Russian courts, as well as the proceedings before the Georgian courts (see, mutatis mutandis, Perez v. France [GC], no. 47287/99, §§ 80-82, ECHR 2004-I)?

13.  Did the applicants, with the exception of the applicant in application no. 31741/18, have at their disposal an effective domestic remedy for their Convention complaints, as required by Article 13 of the Convention in conjunction with the substantive provisions of the Convention they complained about (see Taganova and Others, cited above, §§ 383 ss.)?

APPENDIX

List of applications:

No.

Application no.

Case name

Lodged on

Applicant
Year of Birth
Place of Residence
Nationality

Represented by

1.

25112/07

Kikabidze v. Georgia and Russia

11/04/2007

Anguli KIKABIDZE
1931
Tbilisi
Georgian

Tsiala KIKABIDZE
1937
Tbilisi
Not known

Pavle BERIA

2.

50623/07

Vakhtangidze v. Georgia and Russia

08/10/2007

Makvala VAKHTANGIDZE
Tbilisi
Georgian

Vakhtang VAKHTANGIDZE

3.

60335/11

Vartanov and Others v. Georgia and Russia

21/09/2011

1. Robert Arkadyevich VARTANOV
Moscow
Russian

2. Valentina Stefanovna KOVALENKO
1900
Moscow
Russian

3. Tatyana Fedorovna SHEVCHENKO
1900
Moscow
Russian

Kirill KOROTEEV

4.

31741/18

Galitskaya v. Georgia and Russia

20/06/2018

Yelena Vyacheslavovna GALITSKAYA
1963
Rostov-on-Don
Russian

5.

45073/19

Turkia v. Georgia and Russia

15/08/2019

Yuriy Aleksandrovich TURKIA
1948
Tbilissi
Georgian