European court orders Armenia to pay €6,000 over failure to ensure effective investigation  

The European Court of Human Rights has published a new judgment against Armenia, ordering the country to pay of €6,000 in a criminal case involving a former conscript.

The case, Matevosyan v Armenia, originated in an application (no. 52316/09) against the Republic of Armenia lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms by an Armenian national, Mr Alik Matevosyan (“the applicant”), on 24 September 2009.

 
The applicant was represented by Mr H. Baghdasaryan, a lawyer practising in Herher (Vayots Dzor region). The Armenian Government (“the Government”) were represented by their Agent, Mr G. Kostanyan, Representative of the Republic of Armenia to the European Court of Human Rights.

The applicant alleged, in particular, that the authorities had failed to conduct an effective investigation into his allegations of ill-treatment by military police officers.

On 15 May 2012 the complaint concerning the alleged ineffectiveness of the investigation was communicated to the Government and the remainder of the application was declared inadmissible.

The applicant was born in 1987 and was serving a prison sentence in Nubarashen penal facility at the time when he lodged his application with the Court.

On an unspecified date the applicant was drafted to the Armenian army. At the material time he was performing his military service in the Syunik Region of Armenia.

On 29 April 2006 the dead body of a fellow serviceman, A H, was found in the forest next to the applicant’s military unit. He was hanging from a tree with his arms tied behind his back with wire. On the same day the military prosecutor’s office of Zangezur garrison instituted criminal proceedings in respect of the death. Shortly afterwards the investigation of the case was taken over by the Military Prosecutor’s Office and assigned to investigator A.K.

According to the materials of the case, on 2 May 2006 the applicant was questioned in the town of Kapan in connection with the criminal case. It appears that on the same day he and another serviceman, R H, were subjected to disciplinary punishment in the form of ten days’ detention for beating up A H the previous month. It further appears that the following day the applicant and R.H. were taken to the Military Police Department of the Ministry of Defence in Yerevan (“the Military Police Department”), where they were held until 12 May 2006.

During their detention at the Military Police Department, the applicant and R H were questioned as witnesses in the criminal case. It appears that during questioning on 7 May 2006, R H confessed that he and the applicant had murdered A H.

Despite the applicant’s repeated complaints and allegations that he had been subjected to torture during interrogations by the police, the Criminal Court of Appeal examined the case anew on November 12, 2008 and changed the offence, increasing the sentence to fifteen years’ imprisonment.

The Court found that the authorities failed to conduct an effective investigation into the applicant’s complaint, and obliged the country to pay €6,000 in respect of non-pecuniary damage.