ECHR finds appeals against Georgia over August war inadmissible
By Nika Gamtsemlidze
Friday, October 22
Georgia has recently won another case in the European Court of Human Rights against Russia about the August war. This time, the cases submitted to the court were from Russia.
Both of the cases were assessed as inadmissible by the European court. The cases against Georgia were: ‘Shavlokhova and others vs. Georgia’ and ‘Bekoyeva and others vs. Georgia’.
According to the Minister of Justice, Rati Bregadze, Georgia won another case in the European Court of Human Rights in the case of the August 2008 war. According to Bregadze, the European Court ruled inadmissible the complaints of the residents of the Tskhinvali region, accusing the Georgian side of violating their rights.
According to Bregadze, the ECHR fully shared the arguments of the Georgian side that during the war the Tskhinvali region was bombed by the Russian Federation and the Georgian Armed Forces did not exercise control over this region and the surrounding area.
According to him, the court decided that due to this factor, it is impossible to find any violations made by Georgia. Both of the cases were reported by the ECHR on October 21.
“In order to protect state interests, in 2019-20 the Ministry of Justice of Georgia, together with the Prosecutor General's Office of Georgia, the Ministry of Defense of Georgia and the State Security Service of Georgia, found and presented to the European Court hundreds of pieces of evidence proving that Georgia did not violate international law in 2008,” added Bregadze.
According to the Minister, this ruling reaffirms that the fight for de-occupation and justice continues in a peaceful and just manner.
On January 21, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights upheld all of Georgia's main claims in the August 2008 war. In particular, the European Court of Human Rights shared Georgia's position and accused Russia of torture, inhuman and degrading treatment of Georgian prisoners of war, and civilians.
The verdict of the ECHR, Russia is obligated to pay Georgia 10 million Euros in non-pecuniary damages. The group that should be paid includes about 1,500 Georgian nationals.
According to the Ministry of Justice, in 2008-2009, under the coordination of Russia, more than 3,300 complaints were filed against Georgia in the European Court, however, based on the evidence and legal positions submitted by the Georgian government, up to 2,800 complaints have already been ruled out as unfounded.
