Court name: Fourth Cassation Court of General Jurisdiction of the Russian Federation (Четвертый Кассационный суд общей юрисдикции Российской Федерации)
Date of decision:

The applicant was born in an undisclosed Soviet Union Republic and moved to Russia in 1993. He held a temporary resident permit. He was convicted of a drug-related crime and sentenced to eight years in prison. The Ministry of Justice issued a decision on the "undesirability of his stay" in Russia. The Ministry of Internal Affairs followed up with a decision ordering his deportation as the applicant failed to leave Russia within the prescribed deadline. After being released from prison, the applicant was placed in a migration detention centre for 48 hours; this term was repeatedly extended by the court (prior to his eventual release). Russian authorities contacted Armenian and Azerbaijani authorities, both of which refused to grant the applicant entry as he was not a citizen of their respective countries. The applicant challenged both decision of the Ministry of Justice on the undesirability of his stay in Russia and the decision of Ministry of Internal Affairs ordering his deportation. The challenge was dismissed due to lack of legal grounds to declare the disputed decisions illegal.

Court name: ECtHR
Date of decision:

After discovering that the applicant had omitted information when applying for Russian nationality, his nationality was annulled and an entry ban was enforced. The Court applied a two-pronged approach to assess whether the deprivation of the applicant’s nationality was an interference with his right to private and family life, which assessed (i) the consequences for the applicant, and (ii) whether the measure was arbitrary. In light of the far-reaching consequences of this decision and its apparent arbitrary nature, the Court held that the annulment interfered with the applicant's rights guaranteed under Article 8 ECHR. Further, the Court found that the expulsion of the applicant from Russian territory failed to respect the principle of proportionality, given the lack of evidence of any threat to Russian national security posed by the applicant, thereby violating Article 8.

Court name: Supreme Court
Date of decision:

The applicant is a stateless person, who committed an administrative offence of drug abuse, and was sentenced to administrative detention and expulsion. The Court considered that in his specific circumstances, which included statelessness and long-term residence in Russia since childhood, expulsion would be a disproportionate measure at risk of violating Russia's international human rights commitments, and reduced the sentence to administrative detention only.