Post by tileiohmaleas on Jan 16, 2008 22:52:48 GMT -5
Missing not presumed dead – ECHR
By Philippos Stylianou
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) yesterday found Turkey guilty of violating the rights of nine Greek-Cypriot missing persons and their relatives.
The long-awaited judgment is expected to have far reaching effects on the continuing effort to trace the fate of the Greek Cypriots who disappeared during the 1974 Turkish invasion, as it rejects outright the Turkish position that the missing persons should be presumed dead.
The Strasbourg-based Court affirmed its previous finding that the Committee of Missing Persons (CMP) could not be considered a satisfactory replacement for Turkey’s obligation to carry out an "effective investigation" into the whereabouts of the missing. Even the exhumation and identification of remains, as was the case for one of the missing on the Court list, did not change this.
"While it was true that the remains of Savvas Hadjipanteli had recently been discovered, that did not demonstrate that the CMP has been able to take any meaningful investigative steps beyond the belated location and identification of remains," the ECHR noted in its decision.
And it added: "Nor had that event displaced the Turkish Government’s accountability for the investigative process during the intervening period."
Pressure
Lawyers Kypros Chrysostomides and Achilleas Demetriades who represented the nine missing persons and their relatives in their applications against Turkey, told a press conference in Nicosia that the groundbreaking decision would put Ankara under political and legal pressure to show more cooperation on the humanitarian issue of the missing.
The President of the Committee of Relatives of Missing Persons Nicos Hadjitheodosiou said that following the ECHR decision, Turkey should be convinced to allow access to its army and prison records.
"Only in this way can the information be obtained that would enable the families of the missing to find out what happened to their loved ones," he said.
The seven-judge panel of the ECHR’s Third Section with only Gonul Eronen from Turkey dissenting, held Ankara responsible for the violation of the following articles of the European Convention on Human Rights:
Article 2 for failing to carry out an effective investigation into the fate of nine of the applicants, who disappeared in life threatening circumstances.
Article 3 for subjecting the remaining nine applicants, relatives of the missing, to inhuman and degrading treatment by not informing them about the fate of their loved ones.
Article 5 for depriving the missing persons of their liberty and security at the time of their disappearance.
The Court in its decision drew a sharp distinction between cases of disappearance of persons in southeast Turkey and in the Chechen Republic, where individual applicants were required to give proof that their relatives were taken in custody before they disappeared.
Hostilities
In the case of Cyprus, the Court noted, it would not be realistic to expect applicants to provide more than minimal information about their endangered relatives.
The Court in its decision stressed that Turkey was obliged under international treaties to respect the wounded, prisoners of war and civilians and specifically under the European Convention on Human Rights it was obliged to take reasonable steps to protect the lives of those not, or no longer engaged in hostilities.
Regarding the relatives of those who disappeared while under Turkey’s custody, the Court observed that they "must have undoubtedly suffered most painful uncertainty and anxiety and furthermore their mental anguish did not vanish with the passing of time."
There were altogether 18 applications submitted by nine living persons on behalf of themselves and of nine missing relatives.
The nine were combatants, except for Hadjipantelis whose remains have been identified. They were all seen alive after their capture by the Turkish army in Cyprus and in Turkey where they had been transported as prisoners of war.
The Court awarded only e4,000 for costs per applicant. Pecuniary damages were not awarded since the Court considered that the finding of violations constituted in itself sufficient just satisfaction.
The applications were submitted in 1990 and were declared admissible in 1998. Since then, another 170 similar individual applications have been filed against Turkey in Strasburg. The issue of the missing persons is also included in the 4th Interstate case of Cyprus Vs Turkey and developments following yesterday’s ECHR judgment are expected to run concurrently.