Court name: European Court of Human Rights
Date of decision:
Key aspects: Detention

The applicants were detained in Russia in view of their expulsion respectively to Ukraine and Georgia. They claimed to be stateless but the Russian authorities did not properly assess whether the removal remained a ‘realistic prospect’ throughout detention, thus the Court found a breach of Article 5 ECHR. 

Court name: Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation (Конституционный суд Российской Федерации)
Date of decision:

The Applicant was born in Uzbekistan in 1974 and obtained Russian citizenship in 2005. In 2017, he was convicted of an extremist crime for organisation of an extremist religious community (Nur movement) branch in the city of Blagoveshchensk and sentenced to imprisonment. In January 2019, his Russian citizenship was removed because of the conviction. After being released from prison in April 2019, the Applicant did not have any identification documents except for certificate of release, as his Russian passport was withheld. He did not have a chance to acquire any other documents to legalise his stay in Russia or leave the country, since he was arrested and placed in the migration detention centre five minutes after his release from the prison. As a result, Russian state court of civil jurisdiction declared the Applicant guilty of an administrative offence for violation of rules of stay in the Russian Federation under Article 18.8 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation ("CAO") and prescribed a punishment in the form of penalty and administrative expulsion from the Russian territory.

Russian authorities contacted Uzbekistan to expel him there, however Uzbekistan did not agree to accept the Applicant. As a result, the Applicant remained in custody for about two years, since Russian law does not have provisions granting stateless individuals the right to challenge their detention nor requiring the courts to determine its duration when ordering the detention. Following unsuccessful challenges of his detention in the Russian state courts of civil jurisdiction, the Applicant filed a complaint with the Russian Constitutional Court challenging the constitutionality of the relevant legal provisions. The Constitutional Court dismissed the appeal finding all the challenged provisions were constitutional because its earlier judgment No. 14-P/2017 of 25 May 2017 already provided stateless individuals a right to challenge their further detention three months after the date of the decision to detain and expel them. The Constitutional Court also contacted Uzbekistan authorities again and they finally agreed to receive the Applicant in Uzbekistan.

Court name: Penza Regional Court
Date of decision:

In July 2017, the applicant was punished with deportation from Russia for violating the rules of stay of foreign nationals and was placed in a detention centre for foreign nationals until execution of the deportation order. It was later found that the applicant had lost his Tajik citizenship and deportation to Tajikistan therefore became impossible. The applicant successfully challenged the decision on his deportation due to the impossibility of executing the deportation order, and was released from the detention centre.

Court name: European Court of Human Rights
Date of decision:

This case concerns a stateless applicant born in the Tajikistan Soviet Socialist Republic of the Soviet Union, who was arrested for homelessness in Russia. The District Court ruled that he had to be preventively detained until his expulsion to Tajikistan. Russia tried to obtain travel documentation for the applicant, overlooking the fact that the applicant was not a Tajik national and that Tajikistan had no legal obligation to admit him, resulting in his preventive detention for two years. The Court found a violation of Article 5 ECHR, as the applicant’s detention was not carried out in good faith due to the lack of a realistic prospect of his expulsion and the domestic authorities’ failure to conduct the proceedings with due diligence.

Court name: European Court of Human Rights
Date of decision:

The applicants, a stateless Palestinian from Syria and two Syrian nationals, entered Russia in 2013 and were kept in a detention centre before their expulsion to Syria. The Court held that the Government’s actions breached the applicant’s rights provided under Articles 2 and 3. The Court also stated that Articles 5(4) and 5(1)(f) had been violated with regards to their detention. The Court also held that the restricted contact with their respective representatives had breached Article 34 of the Convention. 

Court name: Supreme Court
Date of decision:

The applicant, who is stateless, was fined for violating immigration rules, and an expulsion order was issued against him, with a detention in an immigration detention centre prior to the expulsion. The applicant appealed against the detention, but the Court found no reasons to question the lawfulness of detention, as the law allows to detain foreigners and stateless persons prior to their expulsion. 

Court name: European Court of Human Rights
Date of decision:

This case concerns a person born in 1962 in Uzbekistan, who has been residing in Russia since 1990. After the fall of the Soviet Union, the applicant did not acquire a new citizenship, and was therefore stateless. He was arrested and detained until expulsion because of his undocumented status, and released after two years based on the expiry of the time-limit for enforcement of the expulsion order. The applicant brought the case to the ECtHR on the grounds that appeal procedures and the conditions of his detention had been inadequate. The Court ruled that there had been a violation of Articles 3 and 5 ECHR.

Court name: Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation (Конституционный суд Российской Федераци)
Date of decision:

The applicant was born in Georgia and moved to Leningrad before the breakup of the Soviet Union, where he was educated and got married. He was never able to exchange his Soviet passport for a Russian passport, was ordered to be expelled while the expulsion was not possible due to his statelessness. His attorney has repeatedly appealed the deportation ruling but in vain.

The decision changed judicial practice and provided a legal ground for the release of stateless persons from detention, even though the amendments to the legislation ordered by the Constitutional Court are still pending (as of May 2021).