POLETAYEV AND OTHERS v. RUSSIA

THIRD SECTION

DECISION

Application no. 28044/20
Yuriy Andreyevich POLETAYEV against Russia
and 2 other applications

(see appended table)

The European Court of Human Rights (Third Section), sitting on 19 June 2025 as a Committee composed of:

 Diana Kovatcheva, President,
 Canòlic Mingorance Cairat,
 Vasilka Sancin, judges,

and Viktoriya Maradudina, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,

Having regard to the above applications lodged on the various dates indicated in the appended table,

Having regard to the observations submitted by the respondent Government in applications nos. 28044/20 and 33682/20,

Having deliberated, decides as follows:

FACTS AND PROCEDURE

The list of applicants is set out in the appended table.

The applicants’ complaints under Article 11 of the Convention concerning the disproportionate measures against organisers and participants of public assemblies were communicated to the Russian Government. In all applications, complaints based on the same facts were also communicated under other provisions of the Convention.

THE LAW

Having regard to the similar subject matter of the applications, the Court finds it appropriate to examine them jointly in a single decision.

The applicants complained about the termination of their participation in public assemblies, including by way of their arrest, and about subsequent administrative-offence proceedings against them.

The Court reiterates that, as a rule, the six-month time-limit runs from the

date of the final decision in the process of exhaustion of domestic remedies (see Varnava and Others v. Türkiye [GC], nos. 16064/90 and 8 others, § 157,

ECHR 2009). In cases under the Code of Administrative Offences of the Russian Federation, the appeal judgment must be considered when applying

both the requirement of exhaustion of domestic remedies and the six-month rule outlined in Article 35 § 1 of the Convention (see Smadikov v. Russia (dec.), no. 10810/15, §§ 41-51, 31 January 2017).

The Court notes that the applicants’ complaints were lodged with the Court more than six months following the final domestic decisions adopted in the administrative-offence proceedings (see the appended table). It follows that the six-month time-limit laid down in Article 35 § 1 of the Convention has not been respected.

As regards the exceptional extension adopted during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Court reiterates that this three-month grace period applies only where the six-month time-limit either began or expired between 16 March and 15 June 2020 (see Saakashvili v. Georgia (dec.), nos. 6232/20 and 22394/20, §§ 46-59, 1 March 2022). In the present cases both the final decision and the introduction of the application fall outside that window; the COVID-19 extension is therefore inapplicable (see Masse v. France (dec.), no. 47506/20, §§ 20-32, 25 March 2025).

Accordingly, the applications must be rejected as lodged out of time under Article 35 §§ 1 and 4 of the Convention.

For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,

Decides to join the applications;

Declares the applications inadmissible.

Done in English and notified in writing on 10 July 2025.

 Viktoriya Maradudina Diana Kovatcheva
 Acting Deputy Registrar President

APPENDIX

List of applications raising complaints under Article 11 of the Convention

(disproportionate measures against organisers and participants of public assemblies)