CEDH · CASELAW;RESOLUTIONS;EXECUTION;ENG — 17 octobre 2007

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margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:11pt } .s10A1560B { width:19.1%; border-style:solid; border-width:0.75pt; padding:0.38pt; vertical-align:top } .s682B94EC { width:15.22%; border-style:solid; border-width:0.75pt; padding:0.38pt; vertical-align:top } .sE8C94B76 { width:17.14%; border-style:solid; border-width:0.75pt; padding:0.38pt; vertical-align:top } .s7DA0E26F { width:17.58%; border-style:solid; border-width:0.75pt; padding:0.38pt; vertical-align:top } .s10966AAC { width:14.84%; border-style:solid; border-width:0.75pt; padding:0.38pt; vertical-align:top } .s6A5D7EE7 { width:29.33pt; display:inline-block } .s6863D229 { width:26pt; display:inline-block } .s7A64F404 { text-decoration:underline } .sB2A0F2B6 { font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .sC4207DBA { font-style:italic; text-decoration:underline; color:#0069d6 } .s5BA4079A { width:22.66pt; display:inline-block } Interim Resolution CM/ResDH(2007)107 concerning the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights   in the case of Velikova and 7 other cases against Bulgaria (see Appendix I)   relating in particular to the ill-treatment inflicted by police forces, including three deaths, and the lack of an effective investigation   (Adopted by the Committee of Ministers on 17 October 2007, at the 1007th meeting of the Ministers' Deputies)   The Committee of Ministers, under the terms of Article 46, paragraph 2, of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, (hereinafter “the Convention”),   Having regard to the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights delivered in the case of Velikova and 7 other cases (for more details see Appendix I), and transmitted to the Committee of Ministers once they had become final under Articles 44 and 46 of the Convention;   Recalling that the violations of the Convention found by the Court in these cases concern the ill-treatment inflicted on the applicants or on their relatives and the resulting deaths in the cases of Velikova, Anguelova and Ognyanova and Choban, as well as the lack of an effective investigation into these facts (for more details see Appendix I);   Recalling that a finding of violations by the Court requires, over and above the payment of just satisfaction awarded in the judgment, the adoption by the respondent state, where appropriate, of - individual measures to put an end to the violations and erase their consequences so as to achieve as far as possible restitutio in integrum ; and   - general measures preventing, similar violations;   Having examined, in accordance with the Rules of the Committee of Ministers concerning the application of Article   46, paragraph 2, of the Convention, the measures adopted to this effect by the respondent Government, the detail of which appears in Appendix II ;   Having noted in this respect that the issue concerning the deficiencies of the legal framework existing in Bulgaria for regulation of the use of firearms by police officers, raised in the case of Tzekov, is being examined in the framework of the supervision of the execution of the case of Nachova and others against Bulgaria (judgment of 6 July 2005);   Individual measures   Notes that the judgments in these cases have recently been transmitted to the Prosecutor General, who is competent to ask for the reopening of the investigations into the deaths and the ill-treatment criticised by the European Court;   Recalls in this respect the obligation for the respondent state, according to the Convention, to conduct effective investigation “in the sense that it is capable of leading to a determination of whether the force used was or was not justified in the circumstances and to the identification and punishment of those responsible”, as well as the position established by the Committee of Ministers according to which a continuing obligation exists to carry such investigations in these cases where procedural violations of Articles 2, 3 and 13 have been found;   Calls upon the government of the respondent state to rapidly adopt all required individual measures in these cases and to inform the Committee of Ministers regularly about this issue;   General measures   Notes with interest the information provided by the government of the respondent state on general measures adopted so far or envisaged with the aim of complying with these judgments (see for more details Appendix   II);   Notes, however, that certain general measures remain to be taken, in particular measures aimed at:   -   improving the initial and ongoing training of all members of police forces, in particular as regards the widespread inclusion of the feature “human rights” in the training;   -   improving procedural guarantees during detention on remand, in particular through the effective implementation of the new regulation concerning the obligation to inform persons on remand of their rights and the formalities to be followed concerning the registration of arrests; .   -   guaranteeing the independence of investigations regarding allegations of ill-treatment inflicted by the police, and in particular ensuring the impartiality of the investigation organs in charge with this kind of cases;   Calls upon the government of the respondent state rapidly to adopt all outstanding measures and to regularly inform the Committee of Ministers on the practical impact of the adopted measures, in particular by submitting statistical data on the investigations carried out in respect of allegations of ill-treatment by the police;   DECIDES to pursue the supervision of the execution of the present judgments until all general measures necessary for the prevention of new, similar violations of the Convention are adopted and their effectiveness does not raise any doubt, and until the Committee of Ministers is satisfied that all necessary individual measures are taken, in order to erase, as far as possible, the consequences of the violations found in respect of the applicants,   DECIDES also to resume consideration of these cases as regards individual measures at each of its DH meetings and, as regards the general measures at the latest within ten months.             Appendix I to Interim Resolution CM/ResDH(2007)107   Details relating to the applications, the judgments and the violations found by the European Court     Application No. Name of the case Date of the judgment Date of the final judgment Payment of the just satisfaction on Time limit for payment 41488/98 Velikova 18/05/2000 04/10/2000 27/12/2000 04/01/2001 38361/97 Anguelova 13/06/2002 13/09/2002 13/12/2002 13/12/2002 42027/98 Toteva 19/05/2004 19/08/2004 16/11/2004 19/11/2004 50222/99 Krastanov 30/09/2004 30/12/2004 21/03/2005 30/03/2005 43233/98 Osman 16/02/2006 16/05/2006 11/08/2006. 16/08/2006 46317/99 Ognyanova and Choban 23/02/2006 23/05/2006 23/08/2006 23/08/2006 45500/99 Tzekov 23/02/2006 23/05/2006 23/08/2006 23/08/2006 55061/00 Kazakova 22/06/2006 22/09/2006 13/12/2006 22/12/2006     -   Violations of Article 2 due to the deaths of the applicants' relatives as a result of ill-treatment inflicted by police officers (cases of Velikova, Anguelova and Ognyanova and Choban);   -   Violation of Article 2 due to the lack of rapid medical assistance during the applicant son's detention (Anguelova case);   -   Violations of Articles 2 and 13 due to the lack of effective investigations on the applicants relatives' deaths (cases of Velikova, Anguelova and Ognyanova and Choban);   -   Violations of Article 3 due to the ill-treatment inflicted by police officers to the applicants or to members of their families (cases of Anguelova, Krastanov, Toteva, Ognyanova and Choban, Osman and Tzekov);   -   Violations of Article 3 due to the lack of effective investigations concerning the ill-treatment inflicted on the applicants (cases of Toteva, Krastanov, Osman and Tzekov) and concerning arguable claims of ill-treatment (Kazakova case);   -   Violations of Article 5§1 due to unlawful detention of members of the applicants' families (cases of Anguelova and Ognyanova and Choban);   -   Violation of Article 6§1 due to the excessive length of certain civil proceedings for compensation initiated by the applicant (Krastanov case);   -   Violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 due to the unlawful destruction of certain property belonging to the applicants during an attempt for their eviction from this property (Osman case).   Appendix II to Interim Resolution CM/ResDH(2007)107   Information provided to the Committee of Ministers by the Government of Bulgaria concerning individual and general measures taken to date or envisaged so as to comply with the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights   I.   Individual measures   On 22 May 2007 the Ministry of Justice forwarded a copy of the Court's judgments in these cases to the Prosecutor General, to whom it falls to request the re-opening of criminal proceedings contested by a judgment of the Court (Articles 421§2 and 422§1, p. 4 of the Code of Criminal Procedure). The Prosecutor General's attention was drawn to the Bulgarian authorities' ongoing obligation to conduct effective investigations into deaths and ill-treatment, or allegations thereof, in cases where the Court has found procedural violations of Articles 2, 3 and 13.   II.   General measures   1) Improvement of vocational training for members of the police   Training in human rights, and in particular in the Convention standards, is part of the compulsory training dispensed to police officers by the Academy of the Ministry of the Interior. During the 2003-2004 academic year, 443 higher-ranking officers and 121 sergeants underwent initial training in this field, and 266 and 81 respectively received further training. Similar activities were run in 2004-2005. In addition, between 1999 and 2003 hundreds of police officers attended seminars and other training activities on compliance with the Convention requirements and the CPT's recommendations in the performance of their duties.   In 2000 a specialist Human Rights Committee was set up within the National Police Directorate. Its main tasks are organising human rights training for the police, analysing the CPT's reports concerning Bulgaria and drawing up proposals for tangible measures to prevent cases of ill-treatment by the police. In 2002 this committee's work led to the introduction of a new declaration form setting out information on detainees' basic rights (the rights to be assisted by a lawyer, to be examined by a doctor and to inform a third party of the detention). This declaration is signed by detainees immediately after they have been taken into custody, the aim being to make police action transparent and provable (Article 54 of the Regulations implementing the Act on the Ministry of the Interior).   A Code of Police Ethics was also introduced in October 2003 by order of the Minister of the Interior. The provisions of this code were drafted in co-operation with the Council of Europe and take account of the Committee of Ministers' Recommendation R(2001)10 on the European Code of Police Ethics.   2) Effective internal remedies in the event of alleged ill-treatment by the police   a) Direct effect of the Convention in Bulgarian law   Bulgarian case-law is constantly evolving so as to take better account of the Convention and the case-law of the European Court of Human Rights, as can be seen from a number of domestic judgments which refer directly to the Convention and to judgments of the Court. This development results in enhanced judicial oversight of public prosecutors' decisions concerning police custody or provisional detention. Two interpretative judgments delivered by the Supreme Court of Cassation in 2002 and a number of judgments by domestic courts making direct reference to the Convention and to Court judgments, particularly with regard to Articles 5 and 6 of the Convention, have been forwarded to the Committee of Ministers (the Supreme Court of Cassation's judgments Nos. 1 of 25.06.2002 and 2 of 2002 and decisions Nos. 1558/2001 and 1515/2001 of the Plovdiv regional court, Nos. 285/2002 and   559/2002 of the Bourgas district court and No. 4306/2001 of the Sofia regional court).   At the same time, a number of training sessions on the Convention for members of the judiciary were held between 2001 and 2006, in particular by the Judicial Training Centre set up in 1999 in co-operation with the Council of Europe.   b) Effective investigation of allegations of ill-treatment by the police   Legislative amendments adopted on 27/04/2001 provide for judicial review of public prosecutors' decisions to close criminal proceedings and empower the courts to send files back to prosecutors with instructions to carry out specific investigation measures (Article 237 of the Code of Criminal Procedure). It should also be noted that under Bulgarian criminal procedure prosecutors need no authorisation of any kind to investigate alleged offences by police officers.   The military prosecution service has drawn up a report on the results of investigations into allegations of police violence over the period 1996-2005. According to this report, 2,950 investigations into complaints of ill-treatment by the police were conducted during this period. These investigations led to the opening of 874 criminal cases against police officers accused of ill-treatment, resulting in 349 convictions (including 10 for homicide, 3 for having provoked the victim to commit suicide, 329 for assault and 7 for illegal deprivation of liberty). In the eleven cases described in detail in the report, the sentences imposed ranged from twenty years' imprisonment to suspended prison sentences. Over the same period no tendency towards an increase or decrease in cases of ill-treatment by the police could be noted.   3) Guarantees against illegal detention by the police   Section 72§1 of the Act on the Ministry of the Interior of 1997 provides, as did section 35§1 of the repealed National Police Act of 1993, that a written warrant must be issued for the detention of an individual by the police. In addition, under Article 54§5 of the Regulations implementing the Act on the Ministry of the Interior, adopted by the Minister of the Interior in 1998, this warrant must be recorded in a special register. Furthermore, in a circular letter dated 13/03/2002, the Director of the National Police reminded all the regional police chiefs of their obligation to take all necessary measures to ensure strict compliance with these rules.   4) Publication and dissemination   The Velikova judgment has been translated and sent by the Ministry of Justice to the Director of the National Police, the Prosecutor General and the head of the Special Investigations Department for distribution to all officials reporting to them, along with a circular drawing these officials' attention to the Court's findings. This judgment has also been published on the Ministry of the Interior's web-site, www.mjeli.government.bg, and distributed to judges by the Judicial Training Centre. The Anguelova, Toteva and Krastanov judgments have also been published on the same web-site. The Krastanov judgment has been distributed, with an accompanying explanatory letter, to directors in the national police, the national office for combating organised crime, the directorate of internal affairs of the city of Sofia and the head of the specialised anti-terrorism unit. The Toteva judgment has been distributed to the police department and public prosecution service of the city of Sevlievo, with an accompanying letter focusing on the Court's key findings. Lastly, the Velikova and Anguelova judgments have been distributed to the military courts, the military prosecution service, the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Defence, so that these bodies can take any measures they deem appropriate (not least of a legislative nature) within their sphere of competence.   III.   Conclusion   The Government of Bulgaria is convinced that the above measures show its determination to take all the individual and general measures necessary to enforce these judgments and, more specifically, to enhance vocational training of members of the police and implement procedural guarantees to ensure the effective prevention of any further violation of the Convention of a similar kind. The Bulgarian authorities will continue to adopt the measures necessary to this end and will keep the Committee of Ministers informed of any new elements, particularly regarding the impact of the measures taken.