FIFTH SECTION
Application no. 12064/08
Galina Stepanovna MUKIY and
Vladimir Davydovich MUKIY against Ukraine
lodged on 7 February 2008
STATEMENT OF FACTS
The applicants, Ms Galina Stepanovna Mukiy and Mr Vladimir Davydovich Mukiy, are Ukrainian nationals who were born in 1954 and 1953 respectively and live in Kurortne village.
A. The circumstances of the case
The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicants, may be summarised as follows.
The applicants are tenants of a flat owned by the Karadagskyy State Nature Reserve (“the Reserve”) in Kurortne village, Crimea. According to them, they have been living in that flat for about twenty-five years.
They sought privatisation of the flat in question. The Reserve’s administration however rejected their request on the ground that no real estate property located in a nature reserve – as was purportedly the case – could be privatised under the national legislation.
On an unspecified date the applicants brought civil proceedings in the Feodosiya Local Court (“the Feodosiya Court”) against the Reserve’s administration seeking removal of any impediments to the flat’s privatisation on its part.
On 18 August 2004 the Feodosiya Court allowed the applicants’ claim, finding that, according to the documents in the case file, residential buildings in Kurortne village were not part of the Reserve. It was noted in the judgment that it was amenable to appeal within a month of its pronouncement.
The defendant appealed, but its appeal was dismissed without examination for failure to comply with procedural requirements.
On 20 September 2004 the Feodosiya Town Prosecutor also lodged an appeal in the defendant’s interest.
On 28 February 2005 the Court of Appeal of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea (“the Court of Appeal”) allowed the prosecutor’s appeal. It concluded that, territorially, the house in question was located in the Reserve’s area and there were no grounds to consider that it was not within the Reserve. The legal ban on privatisation of real estate property in nature reserves was therefore applicable. As a result, the appellate court quashed the judgment of the Feodosiya Court of 18 August 2004 and issued a new one rejecting the applicants’ claim as unfounded.
The applicants appealed on points of law. They submitted that the Court of Appeal had erred in its assessment of the facts of the case. Furthermore, the applicants complained that the prosecutor had lodged his appeal two days late, without requesting an extension of the time-limit.
On 21 November 2007 the Zaporizhzhya Regional Court of Appeal rejected the applicant’s appeal on points of law as unsubstantiated. Its ruling did not contain any assessment of the applicants’ argument concerning the prosecutor’s intervention.
COMPLAINTS
The applicants complain under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention about the length and fairness of the proceedings. They complain, in particular, that the courts accepted and allowed the prosecutor’s appeal lodged in the adversary party’s interest. The applicants also complain that their inability to privatise the flat in which they have been living as tenants for about twenty-five years amounted to a breach of their property rights under Article 1 of Protocol No. 1.
QUESTION
Did the applicants have a fair hearing in the determination of their civil rights and obligations, as required by Article 6 § 1 of the Convention? In particular, was the principle of equality of arms respected as regards the participation of a State prosecutor in the appeal procedure?
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