THIRD SECTION
DECISION
Application no. 10520/21
RYAZAN REGIONAL BRANCH OF
THE RENAISSANCE OF RUSSIA PARTY
against Russia
The European Court of Human Rights (Third Section), sitting on 11 May 2021 as a Committee composed of:
Darian Pavli, President,
Dmitry Dedov,
Peeter Roosma, judges,
and Olga Chernishova, Deputy Section Registrar,
Having regard to the above application lodged on 4 February 2021,
Having deliberated, decides as follows:
THE FACTS
1. The applicant is a regional branch of a nationwide political party the Renaissance of Russia Party (Партия Возрождения России) established under the laws of the Russian Federation.The circumstances of the case
2. The facts of the case, as submitted by the applicant, may be summarised as follows.
3. On 29 July 2020 the applicant submitted the lists of signatures required for the registration of the list of 67 candidates nominated by it for the elections to the Ryazan Regional Duma (a regional legislature).
4. On 7 August 2020 the Electoral Commission of the Ryazan Region refused to register the applicant’s list of candidates due to allegedly insufficient number of signatures to register the list of candidates.
5. The applicant lodged an administrative claim under the Code of Administrative Procedure (the “CAP”) against the above decision. On 17 August 2020 the Rayzan Regional Court, acting as a first-instance court, dismissed the claim. On 10 September 2020 the First Appellate Court of General Jurisdiction upheld the judgment on appeal. Subsequent cassation appeal lodged by the applicant was dismissed on 18 December 2020 by the Administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court of Russia. The applicant did not seek supervisory review of the judgment.Relevant domestic law
6. The relevant provisions of the CAP on supervisory review proceedings as in force prior to November 2018 were summarised in the case of Galkin v. Russia ((dec.), no. 5497/18, §§ 4-10, 20 November 2018).
7. Following amendments made to the CAP by Federal Law no. 451‑FZ of 28 November 2018 (as amended on 17 October 2019), the proceedings starting at the regional level could be pursued on appeal before the newly created appellate courts of general jurisdiction, and, following that, on cassation by the Administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court (Articles 296 (2) and 319 § 2 (3) of the CAP). Thus, there was only one level of cassation review available in such cases. The access to the supervisory review remained unrestrained (Article 332 § 2 (6) of the CAP).
8. The conditions for filing a supervisory review complaint in such cases remained unchanged (see Galkin, cited above, §§ 6-10), except that the power by the President or Deputy President of the Supreme Court to overrule the decision by a single judge not to submit the case to the Presidium became subjected to the time-limit for filing a supervisory review appeal (Article 337 § 4 of the CAP).
COMPLAINTS
9. The applicant complains under Article 3 of Protocol No. 1 to the Convention and Article 13 of the Convention about the refusal of the Electoral Commission to register its list of candidates and the dismissal of the applicant’s claim in which it challenged that decision.
THE LAW
10. Before considering the merits of the case the Court must first determine whether the applicant complied with Article 35 of the Convention, and specifically with the requirement that domestic remedies must be exhausted, as laid down in Article 35 § 1 of the Convention.
11. The Court reiterates that the rule of exhaustion of domestic remedies referred to in Article 35 § 1 of the Convention obliges those seeking to bring a case against a State to use first the remedies provided by the national legal system, thus allowing States the opportunity to put matters right through their own legal systems before being required to answer for their acts before an international body. In order to comply with the rule, applicants should normally use remedies which are available and sufficient to afford redress in respect of the breaches alleged (see, among other authorities, Selmouni v. France [GC], no. 25803/94, § 74, ECHR 1999‑V).
12. The Court has already had an opportunity to examine the review system under the CAP in the case of Chigirinova v. Russia ((dec.), no. 28448/16, 13 December 2016), where it held that in disputes involving public authorities examined under the CAP, a person who intends to lodge an application with the Court had first to challenge a first-instance decision of the district court before the regional court, and thereafter to avail itself of the cassation procedure at two levels of jurisdiction: firstly, before the presidium of a regional court and, subsequently, before the Administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court.
13. In its subsequent decision in Galkin (cited above), the Court clarified that in those exceptional circumstances when the proceedings under the CAP had started at the regional level, had been pursued, on appeal, before the Administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court, and where, as a result, cassation review had not been available, an application for a supervisory review fell within the sequence of domestic remedies which an applicant was required to exhaust for the purposes of Article 35 § 1 of the Convention.
14. Following amendments made to the CAP in 2018 and 2019, the first level of cassation review in such cases became available to the applicants, unlike the second level of cassation review, while the access to the supervisory review remained unrestrained (see paragraph 7 above).
15. The applicant in the present case was able to initiate supervisory review after its first cassation appeal had been dismissed by the Administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court (see paragraph 7 above).
16. The supervisory-review procedure in this case was directly accessible to the applicant, was capable of giving an answer to the substance of its Convention complaints and was accompanied by the same level of safeguards as the analogous supervisory review procedure at stake in Galkin (cited above) (see paragraph 8 above).
17. In view of the above, the Court finds that in cases where the proceedings under the CAP start at the regional level and are pursued before an appellate court of general jurisdiction and, following it, before the Administrative Chamber of the Supreme Court, sitting as a cassation court, as in the present case, an application for a supervisory review falls within the sequence of domestic remedies which an applicant is required to exhaust for the purposes of Article 35 § 1 of the Convention (see Galkin, cited above, § 19).
18. The Court observes that the applicant has not lodged a supervisory‑review application with the Supreme Court of Russia. It therefore follows that its application to the Court must be rejected under Article 35 §§ 1 and 4 of the Convention for non-exhaustion of domestic remedies.
For these reasons, the Court, unanimously,
Declares the application inadmissible.
Done in English and notified in writing on 10 June 2021.
Olga ChernishovaDarian Pavli
Deputy RegistrarPresident
Full & Egal Universal Law Academy