CEDH · CASELAW;JUDGMENTS;CHAMBER;ENG — 18 juin 2024

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margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .s5E1364CA { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:12pt; text-align:center; page-break-inside:avoid; page-break-after:avoid; font-size:14pt } .sD00444C6 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:14pt } .s75A32C27 { border-collapse:collapse } .s2F3EB0E4 { border:0.75pt solid #838383; padding:1.02pt 5.03pt; vertical-align:top; background-color:#dfdfdf } .s5FFF0A7F { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:9pt } .sE1A7A04C { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; color:#424242 } .sBAADFE8C { border:0.75pt solid #838383; padding:1.02pt 5.03pt; vertical-align:top } .s2EBECB52 { font-family:Arial; font-size:9pt; list-style-position:inside } .sB1443F4B { width:23.49pt; font:7pt 'Times New Roman'; display:inline-block } THIRD SECTION CASE OF SUPRUN AND OTHERS v. RUSSIA (Applications nos. 58029/12 and 4 others)   JUDGMENT Art 10 • Freedom to receive information • Refusal to provide applicants access to archival information regarding Soviet political repression, make copies or take photographs thereof; conviction of one applicant for collecting information • Gathering of information a relevant preparatory step for research and publications and contributed to public debate on Soviet political repression • Art 10 applicable • Interference with applicants’ right to receive information •   Taking photographs or making copies of archival documents facilitated a more precise and faithful dissemination of historical records • Authorities’ failure to show how the disclosure of the information at issue affected the privacy of presumably deceased individuals • Impact on applicants’ research on descendants’ feelings, if any, minimal and remote   • Domestic courts made no genuine attempt to assess applicability of Art 8 •   Access sought to official data compiled in historical period relating to public or professional (and not personal) life of those involved • Restrictions on access to information did not pursue any “pressing social need” and was not based on relevant and sufficient reasons • Restriction on acquiring copies of archival documents did not pursue legitimate aim and was not “necessary in a democratic society”   Prepared by the Registry. Does not bind the Court.   STRASBOURG 18 June 2024   FINAL   18/09/2024   This judgment has become final under Article 44 § 2 of the Convention. It may be subject to editorial revision. In the case of Suprun and Others v. Russia, The European Court of Human Rights (Third Section), sitting as a Chamber composed of:   Georgios A. Serghides , President ,   Jolien Schukking,   Darian Pavli,   Peeter Roosma,   Ioannis Ktistakis,   Andreas Zünd,   Oddný Mjöll Arnardóttir , judges , and Milan Blaško, Section Registrar, Having regard to: the five applications (see numbers in the appendix) against the Russian Federation lodged with the Court under Article   34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) by six individuals and one non-governmental organisation (“the applicants”); the decision to give notice to the Russian Government (“the Government”) of the complaints concerning the applicants’ access to information held in the State archives, and to declare inadmissible the remainder of each application except the case of Mr   Suprun (no.   58029/12); the observations submitted by the Government in the case of Mr   Suprun; the observations submitted by the applicants; the comments submitted by the International Federation for Human Rights   (FIDH) and ARTICLE   19 which were granted leave to intervene by the President of the Section; the decision by the Swiss Government not to exercise their right to intervene in the case of a Swiss national, Ms   Dupuy (no.   29440/19); the decision of the President of the Section to appoint one of the elected judges of the Court to sit as an ad hoc judge, applying by analogy Rule   29 §   2 of the Rules of the Court (see Kutayev v.   Russia , no.   17912/15, §§   5-8, 24   January 2023); Having deliberated in private on 21 May 2024, Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date: INTRODUCTION 1.     The case concerns the restrictions on the applicants’ access to archival information regarding Soviet political repression. THE FACTS 2.     The facts of each application may be summarised as follows. Suprun v .   Russia, no .   58029/12 3.     The applicant, Mr   Mikhail Suprun, was serving at the material time as the head of the Russian History Department at the Lomonosov Pomor State University in Arkhangelsk. He had authored more than 160 academic publications, including four books on the history of the Second World War. 4 .     In 2007, a cooperation contract was signed between, on one side, the Pomor State University, represented by its dean and Mr   Suprun, and the Information Centre of the Arkhangelsk Regional Police, represented by its director, D., and, on the other side, the German Red Cross and the Historic Research Society of Germans from Russia ( Historischer Forschungsverein der Deutschen aus Russland E.V. ). 5 .     The contract’s scope included the “processing of up to 40,000 records from Russian archives relating to victims of internment, repression and deportation who were civilian German subjects, former USSR citizens of German ethnic origin, German Wehrmacht officers, German civil servants, and ethnic Germans with nationality of other Eastern European states”. Their personal files were to be scanned and the data entered into a database, which was to include fields such as name, date and place of birth, last known home address, profession, family composition, date of death, date and place of deportation, period and place of “forced settlement”, grounds for release, ethnic origin, the arresting and convicting authorities, the nature of the charge, and the record number. 6.     The contract imposed limitations on the use of personal data, specifying it could only be used “for humanitarian and academic purposes”. Any publication on the Internet or commercial use was prohibited, and the transfer of the database or parts thereof to third parties necessitated the consent of the contract’s signatories. 7.     Following the processing of the records, the University and the Historic Research Society were to publish a memorial book, available in both German and Russian languages. 8 .     Between October 2007 and December 2008 Mr   Suprun worked on the memorial book titled “Ethnic Russian Germans, Victims of Repression in the 1940s”, focusing on the fate of forced settlers. He successfully processed over 8,000 records from the archives of the Information Centre of the Arkhangelsk Regional Police. 9.     On 13   September 2009 an investigator for particularly important cases with the Investigations Committee of the Arkhangelsk Region initiated criminal proceedings against Mr   Suprun, based in particular on findings from an inquiry by the Federal Security Service (FSB). Mr   Suprun was accused of acquiring, with the alleged connivance of Mr   D., and selling the personal data of USSR citizens of German origin without their consent. On the same day, investigators searched his flat and seized his electronic devices along with the original contract. 10 .     The trial was held in the Oktyabrskiy District Court of Arkhangelsk. The prosecution argued that Mr   Suprun had “collected, through the copying of personal records and decisions concerning special settlers, personal data and information on the private lives of [twenty individuals], which was contained in the personal files of special settlers”. The heirs of these special settlers were designated as injured parties. Some testified that they had not authorised anyone to copy information from the personal files of their ancestors, stating that this aspect of their lives had always been considered a “shameful secret”. However, five witnesses stated that they did not regard the information from the personal files as a personal or family secret. 11.     On 8   December 2011 the District Court found Mr   Suprun guilty under Article   137 of the Criminal Code for unlawfully collecting personal and family secrets of the injured parties and transferring them abroad without their consent. The court determined that the documents Mr   Suprun had copied from the files of special settlers contained personal and family secrets as they related to identifiable individuals and their families, actions that could potentially harm their and their families’ reputations. The court exempted Mr   Suprun from criminal responsibility due to the expired statute of limitations. 12.     In his appeal, Mr   Suprun’s counsel contended, among other points, that information regarding the settlers’ removal, imprisonment, repatriation, and judicial sanctions against them fell outside the realm of their private lives as it involved their interactions with public authorities. 13 .     On 28   February 2012 the Arkhangelsk Regional Court dismissed the appeal. Despite recognising the absence of a legal definition for “private life” and “personal and family secret”, the Regional Court upheld the original judgment on the grounds that Mr   Suprun’s actions were unlawful due to the lack of consent from the injured parties and the absence of any legal provision that would have permitted him to collect such information. Dupuy v .   Russia, no .   29440/19 14.     The applicant, Ms   Marie Dupuy, née von Dardel, is the great-niece of Mr   Raoul Wallenberg, a Swedish diplomat who saved the lives of tens of thousands of Hungarian Jews at the end of the Second World War. 15.     In January 1945 Soviet military counterintelligence arrested Mr   Wallenberg and his driver, Mr   Langfelder, transferring them to Moscow for interrogation. Despite repeated inquiries from the Swedish Government, the Soviet authorities initially maintained they had never detained Mr   Wallenberg. They acknowledged he had been in their custody after returning prisoners-of-war reported seeing him in a Moscow prison. According to a statement issued by the Soviet Government on 6   February 1957, Mr   Wallenberg succumbed to a heart attack in the Lubyanka Prison on 17   July 1947. 16.     Between 1991 and 2000 a joint Russian-Swedish Working Group investigated Mr   Wallenberg’s fate, confirming his presence in two Moscow prisons, Lubyanka and Lefortovo, from 1945 to 1947. During a final     press ‑ conference held on 16   January 2001, a member of the Working Group from the FSB acknowledged the existence of significant evidence suggesting that Mr   Wallenberg had died “a violent death” in a prison operated by the Ministry of State Security. 17.     In 2009 Ms   Dupuy authorised two independent researchers to collect information on the fate of Mr   Wallenberg. They submitted a list of questions to the Central Archive of the FSB. The questions concerned the records of the Lubyanka Prison, including the prisoners’ interrogations register for 1947. A reply from the FSB Central Archive dated 2   November 2009 stated that a prisoner, identified only as “Prisoner no.   7”, was “with great likelihood the Swedish diplomat Raoul Wallenberg” who was interrogated on 23   July 1947. If this information were to be confirmed, it would have meant that the previous claim that Mr   Wallenberg died on 17   July 1947, was incorrect. 18 .     The FSB Central Archive released a censored copy of two records of interrogations of Mr   Langfelder and his cell-mate Mr   Katona to the researchers. The records were apparently located on the same page of the journal as the interrogation record for “Prisoner no.   7”. According to the FSB information, the three men were interrogated together on 22 and 23   July 1947. The FSB however did not give a reason for their refusal to release a copy of the interrogation record of “Prisoner no.   7”. 19.     On 16   March 2017 Ms   Dupuy filed three requests for information to the FSB Central Archive in preparation of a publication on the fate of Mr   Wallenberg after his arrest by Soviet troops. She asked to be given unredacted copies of archival documents, including specific pages of various registers from the Lubyanka and Lefortovo prisons, the prisoners’ interrogation registers, the prisoners’ transfer registers, the registers of prisoners’ belongings, and the general alphabetical register of prisoners. 20 .     On 3   April 2017 the FSB Central Archive replied that access to the documents she requested could not be granted. Ms   Dupuy was informed as follows: “The journals of calling prisoners for interrogation for the years 1945-1947 have already been made available to independent researchers. These journals contain not only the names of individuals associated with Wallenberg but also those of third parties unrelated to the case of the Swedish diplomat. Consequently, it is impossible to provide full copies of these pages, and this has been communicated to researchers on several occasions”. 21.     On 26   July 2017 Ms   Dupuy initiated an administrative claim in the Meshchanskiy District Court of Moscow, challenging the refusal as unlawful and seeking access to the requested documents. She argued that there existed a public interest in accessing this information, as it could elucidate the fate of the well-known historical figure, Mr   Wallenberg. As a close relative of Mr   Wallenberg, she asserted that under Russian law she possessed the necessary rights and authority to access such information. Furthermore, Ms   Dupuy highlighted her active participation in various research projects concerning Mr   Wallenberg. She emphasised that the information requested was within the FSB’s possession, readily available, and did not require any additional data collection by the FSB. 22 .     On 18   September 2017 the District Court dismissed Ms   Dupuy’s claim. The court stated that the archival documents she requested contained private information about third parties unconnected with the Wallenberg case and, for that reason, could not be given to her. Furthermore, insofar as a portion of the information requested had already been given to her representatives and to the Russian-Swedish Working Group, the FSB’s denial did not infringe upon any of her rights. 23.     In her appeal, Ms   Dupuy asserted that the requested documents did not contain personal secrets and should be available for public and State scrutiny. She also disputed the claim that she, or her representatives, had ever received these documents. Additionally, she argued that if any researcher had been granted access to this information, she should be entitled to the same. 24.     On 20   February 2018 the Moscow City Court dismissed the appeal. It declined to assess the lawfulness of the refusal to grant access to the information, stating, “there were no grounds to believe that the [FSB Central Archive] had provided unreliable information in responding to the request”. 25.     On 6 July and 19   November 2018 the Moscow City Court and the Supreme Court of Russia, respectively, refused to consider further appeals on points of law. Kulakova and Others v .   Russia, no .   12396/21 26.     The applicants, Ms   Yevgeniya Kulakova, Ms   Olga Startseva and Ms   Yelena Kondrakhina, collaborate with the Iofe Foundation, an informal community and online research centre. The centre, founded by the former political prisoner Veniamin Iofe, is dedicated to documenting the history of Soviet terror, the Gulag, and resistance to the regime. Its online archive, which focuses on the history of Soviet repression, encompasses a variety of materials, including personal documents, copies of investigative files – otherwise only accessible through in-person visits to the FSB archives – as well as memoirs, recorded oral narratives, and photographs. 27 .     On 29 March and 24   April 2019 the applicants reviewed the historic investigative case files at the FSB’s archives in St Petersburg. Each time they were granted two hours for their review but were not permitted to photograph the materials. Despite their best efforts to transcribe the materials using their laptops, they were unable to complete the task within the allotted time. They requested permission either to photograph the untranscribed materials or to receive copies. By letters dated 10 April and 14   May 2019, the FSB denied the request for copies, claiming that the law restricted the right to obtain copies from terminated criminal cases to rehabilitated persons and their heirs. The letters did not address the possibility of photographing the materials. 28.     The applicants submitted a claim to the Dzerzhinskiy District Court of St Petersburg, contesting the FSB’s responses as unlawful. They sought either the provision of copies of the documents or, in the alternative, permission to use technical means, such as photography, to create their own copies. 29 .     On 18   September 2019 the District Court denied the claim on the grounds that section   11 §   3 of the Rehabilitation Act governing the procedure for obtaining copies from archival criminal cases did not extend this right to individuals other than the rehabilitated and their relatives. 30.     The applicants appealed, contending that the judge did not adequately consider the proportionality of the restriction on their right to obtain information, resulting in a disproportionate and discriminatory limitation. 31.     On 14   January 2020 the St Petersburg City Court dismissed their appeal. On 3 June and 23   October 2020 the Third Cassation Court and the Supreme Court of Russia, respectively, summarily dismissed their appeals on points of law. PRUDOVSKIY v .   RUSSIA, no .   61350/21 32.     The applicant, Mr   Sergey Prudovskiy, is a historian specialising in the study of Soviet political repression. He has published several books, including one that details the detention of his grandfather in the Gulag. 33.     Mr   Prudovskiy’s research has particularly focused on the “ethnic operations” of the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD), a series of mass repressive campaigns targeting foreign nationals and specific ethnicities within the USSR, but also ethnic Russians living abroad. The “Harbin Operation” was one such campaign, targeting former employees of the Chinese Eastern Railway who were relocated to the USSR following the sale of the railway to the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo in 1935. The extrajudicial three-members committees of the NKVD, known as “troika”, considered a total of 30,938 cases of former Harbin residents, resulting in 19,312 death sentences and 10,669 other penalties. Accessing the identities of NKVD officers 34 .     Among these victims was Ms   Tatyana Kulik. Arrested in November 1937, she was sentenced to death as a Japanese spy by an NKVD troika and executed the following day. Mr   Prudovskiy considered her case for inclusion in his upcoming book about the Harbin Operation. In 2018 he submitted a request to the FSB in Moscow to be granted access to her case file. Access was eventually granted but only to photocopies of the originals in which the positions, names and signatures of the NKVD officers and prosecutors involved in her case were redacted. The FSB justified this by referring to an unpublished 2014 conclusion by the Interdepartmental Commission on the Protection of State Secrets, which extended the confidentiality period of certain information from 1917-1991 by thirty years, until 2044. 35.     Mr   Prudovskiy challenged the FSB’s refusal to provide unredacted information, contending that such information did not constitute a State secret as materials concerning human rights violations by State authorities and officials can never be classified. 36 .     On 4   June 2020 the Moscow City Court dismissed the challenge, finding that the information concerning NKVD and USSR Prosecutor’s Office staff revealed identities of counterintelligence personnel and their methods and operations, which were protected under specific clauses of the List of Information Classified as State Secrets. In his grounds of appeal, Mr   Prudovskiy submitted that classifying the case of Kulik, a rehabilitated victim of political repression, contradicted the State Secrets Act. He maintained that Russian law did not allow for the blanket classification of all information related to security apparatus staff, particularly those involved in the 1930s State terror. On 10   October 2020 the First Appellate Court upheld the original decision, affirming that the surnames, positions, titles, and signatures involved in Kulik’s case remain State secrets. It did not address the claim that information about unconstitutional and unlawful acts can never be classified. On 23 April and 29   July 2021 the Second Cassation Court and the Supreme Court of Russia, respectively, declined to consider further appeals on points of law. Acquiring copies of archival documents 37 .     In November 2019 Mr   Prudovskiy submitted a request to the FSB Central Archive, seeking either colour copies of approximately fifteen pages of archival documents or permission to photograph these documents by his own means. The documents, including prisoner transfer records and execution reports, were intended for use as illustrations in his forthcoming book about the Harbin Operation. The Central Archive denied this request, permitting only the viewing of the documents in the reading room. 38 .     Mr   Prudovskiy challenged this refusal in the Khoroshevskiy District Court of Moscow, arguing that it violated his right to access information in so far as obtaining copies for scientific, research, or other lawful purposes constituted a legitimate right for users of archives. On 7   June 2020 the District Court dismissed his complaint. The court held that only rehabilitated persons and their relatives were entitled to free copies. Furthermore, it stated that Mr   Prudovskiy did not possess the right to independently copy archival documents, as no law or regulation provided for such a right. 39 .     On 8   September 2020 the Moscow City Court upheld that decision on appeal. On 23   December 2020 and 8   June 2021 further appeals on points of law were dismissed by the Second Cassation Court and the Supreme Court of Russia, respectively. These courts maintained that the refusal to permit independent copying did not contravene existing laws nor infringe upon Mr   Prudovskiy’s right to search for and receive information. Access to information about a non-rehabilitated NKVD officer 40 .     In December 2019 Mr   Prudovskiy requested access to archived criminal cases of former NKVD officers, including that of an officer who was convicted for negligence during the NKVD’s “ethnic operations” and had not been rehabilitated. The FSB Central Archive provided Mr   Prudovskiy with a report on the review of his case stating that he had not been rehabilitated but denied access to the case file. It relied on the 2006 order (see paragraph 58 below). 41.     Mr   Prudovskiy contested this refusal in the Khoroshevsky District Court. He argued that the 2006 order was not applicable to the cases of individuals who had not been rehabilitated and that the documents, being over seventy-five years old and unclassified, should be accessible. On 20   July 2020 the District Court upheld the FSB’s decision. 42 .     On 14   December 2020 the Moscow City Court dismissed the appeal, noting that the denial of access did not impinge upon Mr   Prudovskiy’s rights as he was not a relative of the convicted officer. The Second Cassation Court, on 16   June 2021, and the Supreme Court of Russia, on 27   September 2021, rejected further appeals on points of law. INTERNATIONAL MEMORIAL v .   RUSSIA, no .   25390/22 43.     The applicant, International Memorial, is a non-governmental organisation under Russian law established during the perestroika era to research and document Soviet political repression. In October 2022 Memorial was awarded that year’s Nobel Peace Prize, along with the Ukrainian human rights organisation Centre for Civil Liberties and Belarusian activist Ales Bialiatski, for their efforts in “document[ing] war crimes, human rights abuses, and the abuse of power”. Acquiring copies of the NKVD troika protocols 44.     International Memorial, as part of its various initiatives, carried out a documentation project about political repression in the Republic of Karelia during the years 1937-38. A significant aspect of this project was the creation of a website dedicated to the Great Terror in Karelia. The website was designed to display, in particular, copies of protocols from the Karelian NKVD troikas intended to provide historical validation of the events. 45.     In December 2019 International Memorial submitted a request to the Karelian FSB for access to NKVD troika protocols, with the intention of either taking photographs of these documents independently or obtaining copies for a fee. The FSB denied the request, stating that the law only allows the provision of document copies in two situations: free copies for individuals who have been rehabilitated and their relatives, and for purposes associated with the social protection. Accordingly, International Memorial was only permitted to review the original documents. 46.     International Memorial lodged a complaint with the Petrozavodsk City Court of Karelia, contending that the restriction on copying unduly burdened their research and constituted discrimination against users of the FSB archives in comparison to other public archives. On 17   June 2020 the City Court upheld the FSB’s refusal as lawful, stating that “the existing legal framework governing the usage of archival documents does not provide for independent copying or photography”. 47.     On 7   September 2020 the Supreme Court of the Republic of Karelia upheld the judgment of the City Court. The Supreme Court recognised International Memorial’s right to access documents relating to political repression but held that this right did not include the making of copies, which was a right reserved for rehabilitated individuals and their relatives. 48.     Subsequent appeals on points of law were dismissed by the Third Cassation Court on 7   April 2021, and by the Supreme Court of Russia on 9   November 2021. Information on prosecutors who participated in NKVD troikas 49 .     In 1989 the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR formally repudiated the extrajudicial mass repressions that occurred during the Great Terror in 1937-38 and declared unconstitutional all decisions made by the NKVD troikas and other extrajudicial entities. International Memorial embarked on a project to compile a directory of all troika members, including NKVD officers, members of the Bolshevik Communist Party, and prosecutors responsible for fabricating charges against citizens. The majority of the material for the directory was gathered independently by members of International Memorial. However, they required additional information concerning prosecutors who were part of the troikas to complete their work. 50 .     In July 2019 researchers from the Memorial Research and Educational Centre, in collaboration with International Memorial, requested information from the General Prosecutor’s Office. They sought information related to eleven former prosecutors who were part of the NKVD troikas. Details requested included their names, dates of birth and death, places of birth, social and educational background, party membership, and service records. The General Prosecutor’s Office denied the request, relying on the Personal Data Act which prohibited the disclosure of personal data without consent from the individual concerned or their heirs. 51.     International Memorial contested the refusal before the Tverskoy District Court of Moscow. They argued that the information requested was related not to personal and family life but to the prosecutors’ official duties and that it was more than seventy-five years old. The Personal Data Act did not apply to access to archival documents and permitted the processing of personal data for significant public and academic purposes. International Memorial also asserted that restricting access to information about these prosecutors violated the right to freely receive and disseminate information regarding individuals involved in political repression in the USSR. 52 .     On 24   July 2020 the District Court dismissed the challenge on the grounds that the archival materials regarding the prosecutors included details of their private lives and personal and family secrets, which could lead to their identification. The District Court also declared that there was no significant public interest in disclosing information about the prosecutors because their membership in an illegal extrajudicial body, which issued verdicts including death sentences, was not conclusive evidence of crimes against justice. On 4   March 2021 the Moscow City Court upheld that decision on appeal. 53.     On 4   August 2021 the Second Cassation Court and, on 18   February 2022, the Supreme Court of Russia dismissed appeals on points of law. RELEVANT LEGAL FRAMEWORK AND PRACTICE Domestic legal framework 54.     The Federal Law on Rehabilitation of Victims of Political Repression (“the Rehabilitation Act”), no.   1761-1 of 18   October 1991, condemned “the years of terror and mass persecution of people as incompatible with the idea of law and justice” and declared its aim as “providing rehabilitation for every victim of political repression on Russian soil since the [1917 Bolshevik Revolution]”. Individuals who were convicted of offences against the State by decisions of [Soviet secret police known as VChK, GPU, NKVD, MGB], prosecutors, “special formations”, troikas and other quasi-judicial bodies were eligible for rehabilitation (section   3). Individuals who have been rehabilitated or, in the event of their death, their heirs, have the right to access the case files of completed criminal and administrative proceedings and to obtain copies of documents. The access by other persons to these materials is regulated by the provisions on access to State archives (section   11 §   3). 55.     The Federal Law on State Secrets (“the State Secrets Act”), no.   5485 ‑ 1 of 21   July 1993, establishes that facts concerning violations of human rights and freedoms and illegal acts by State authorities and their officials may not be classified as State secrets (section   7). 56.     The Federal Law on Archives (“the Archives Act”), no.   125-FZ of 22   October 2004, provides that access to archival documents may in particular include the provision of the original documents or copies thereof as requested (section   24 §   1.1(2)). Access to archival documents containing the personal and family secrets of an individual, information about their private life, or information that may harm their safety can be restricted for a duration of seventy-five years from the date these documents were created (section   25   §   3). Users of archival documents have the right to use, transfer, and distribute information contained within the archival documents provided to them, as well as copies of these archival documents, for any lawful purposes and in any lawful manner (section   26 §   1). 57.     The Federal Law on Personal Data (“the Personal Data Act”), no.   152 ‑ FZ of 27   July 2006, establishes that issues concerning the storage, acquisition, recording, and use of documents of the Archival Fund of the Russian Federation and other archival documents containing personal data are excluded from its scope (section   1 §   2). 58 .     A joint order by the Ministry of Culture, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the FSB, no.   375/584/352 of 25   July 2006, adopted the regulations on access to materials on closed criminal cases of individuals subjected to political repression stored at the archives of State bodies. Access to criminal and administrative cases concerning those who have been denied rehabilitation is excluded from the scope of the order. In response to requests for access to case files of non-rehabilitated individuals, the archives issue an official note containing the results of the review (point 5). Access to completed criminal and administrative cases is granted to rehabilitated individuals, their next-of-kin, legal heirs, and members of public authorities. Other persons may be granted access to the case materials before the expiration of seventy-five years from the date of creation of the documents with the written consent of the rehabilitated individuals or their heirs (point   6). The right of access to the materials includes the right to review the documents in the case file and to receive copies of them (point 7). International material United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) 59.     At its sixty-first session in February 2005, the Commission on Human Rights of the ECOSOC deliberated on a report by the independent expert, Diane Orentlicher. The report included the “Updated Set of Principles for the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights Through Action to Combat Impunity” as an annex (E/CN.4/2005/102/Add.1, 2005). The Updated Set of Principles introduces the “right to know” which encompasses the “inalienable right to know the truth about past events concerning the perpetration of heinous crimes and about the circumstances and reasons that led, through massive or systematic violations, to the perpetration of those crimes” (Principle 2). To give effect to the right to know, it outlines the State’s duty to “ensure the preservation of, and access to, archives concerning violations of human rights and humanitarian law” (Principle 5). It specifies that “access to archives should also be facilitated in the interest of historical research, subject to reasonable restrictions aimed at safeguarding the privacy and security of victims and other individuals. Formal requirements governing access may not be used for purposes of censorship” (Principle 15). Council of Europe 60.     In Recommendation No. R (2000) 13 of 13   July 2000 on a European policy on access to archives, the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe, acknowledging that “a country does not become fully democratic until each one of its inhabitants has the possibility of knowing in an objective manner the elements of their history,” called upon Member States to implement legislation on access to archives inspired by the principles set forth in the recommendation. Principles 5 and 6 mandate a non-discriminatory approach to access to archives, stating that “the criteria for access to public archives, defined in law, should apply to all archives across the entire national territory, irrespective of the Archives responsible for their preservation” and affirming access to public archives as a right within a political system founded on democratic values. 61 .     The Council of Europe Convention on Access to Official Documents (CETS No. 205), also known as the Tromsø Convention, entered into force on 1   December 2020. The Russian Federation was not a party to it. The Tromsø Convention was the first binding international legal instrument to recognise the right of everyone to access official documents held by public authorities without discrimination and regardless of the requester’s status or motives in seeking access. All official documents are, in principle, public and can be withheld only subject to the protection of other rights and legitimate interests specifically listed in the Convention, unless there is an overriding public interest in disclosure. The Tromsø Convention establishes minimum standards for the prompt and fair processing of requests for access to official documents by public authorities holding the documents, as well as for internal administrative reviews and appeals to independent bodies or courts in the case of request denials. According to its Article   6 §   1, when access to an official document is granted, the applicant has the right to choose whether to inspect the original or a copy, or to receive a copy of it in any available form or format of his or her choice unless the preference expressed is unreasonable. Research submitted by the applicants 62 .     In 2021 the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) published a report entitled “Russia: Crimes Against History”. The report offered an overview of the legal framework in Russia governing the issues related to historical memory and catalogued instances identified as “crimes against history” committed by the Russian authorities. These “crimes” included legislation that suppressed freedom of expression on historical matters, practices of censorship, denial of access to archives, and the State’s failure to address crimes from the Soviet era. 63.     After a brief period of relatively open access to archives regarding Soviet State terror, the authorities continued to keep secret most of the historical records of the Soviet security services. As recently as 2014, the Inter ‑ Agency Commission for the Protection of State Secrets extended the classification period for the majority of the 1917-1991 documents from the Soviet security services for an additional thirty years, the maximum duration permitted under the law. Consequently, most of the Soviet security services’ archives would remain confidential until 2044. Beyond secrecy, the authorities have invoked personal data arguments to obstruct historians’ access to archival documents, thus effectively rendering “the creation of any encyclopaedias and biographical reference books impossible”. 64 .     Access to archival files in completed criminal cases against the victims of Soviet repression has been governed by a special legal framework. The 1991 Rehabilitation Act stipulated that “rehabilitated individuals” – victims recognised as such by the State – were entitled to access their case files. However, from 2006 onwards, the FSB placed restrictions on this right by mandating archives to limit access to the documents containing personal data of “individuals other than the victims”, namely, State officials involved in the persecution. For archive users other than the victims, such as historians and researchers, the 2004 Archives Act provided for free access to archives, with the proviso that documents containing information on “personal and family secrets or private life” would be restricted for a period of seventy-five years from the date of creation. Following the lapse of the seventy-five-year period, FSB officials devised new pretexts to deny access, asserting that the documents contained “confidential information”, specifically the names of troika members, claiming that their disclosure “could harm both the living relatives of those officials and the objective assessment of the 1937-1938 historical period”. THE LAW MATTERS OF PROCEDURE Joinder of the applications 65.     Having regard to the similar subject matter of the applications, the Court finds it appropriate to examine them jointly in a single judgment. Consequences of the Government’s failure to participate in the proceedings 66.     The Court further notes that the respondent Government, by failing to submit the written observations in the cases which were communicated to them after cessation of Russia’s membership of the Council of Europe, manifested an intention to abstain from participating in their examination. However, the cessation of a Contracting Party’s membership in the Council of Europe does not release it from its duty to cooperate with the Convention bodies. Consequently, the Government’s failure to engage in the proceedings cannot constitute an obstacle to the examination of the case (see Svetova and   Others v.   Russia , no.   54714/17, §§   29-31, 24   January 2023, and Georgia v.   Russia (II) (just satisfaction) [GC], no.   38263/08, §§   25-27, 28   April 2023). Procedural succession in respect of International Memorial 67 .     Following the liquidation of International Memorial, the chairman of its board, Mr   Yan Zbignevich Rachinskiy, and the executive director, Ms   Yelena Borisovna Zhemkova, requested the Court to allow them to continue the proceedings in its stead. 68.     Applying the approach to procedural succession concerning liquidated organisations which it relied upon in Ecodefence and Others v.   Russia (nos.   9988/13 and 60 others, §§   66-69 and 421, 14   June 2022), the Court accepts that Mr   Rachinskiy and Ms   Zhemkova have standing to pursue the application lodged by International Memorial. ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLE 10 OF THE CONVENTION 69.     The applicants complained that restrictions on their access to archival information on Soviet political repression breached their right to receive information under Article   10 of the Convention, which reads as follows: “1.     Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to ... receive ... information ... without interference by public authority ... 2.     The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others ...” Admissibility The Court’s jurisdiction 70.     The Court first observes that the facts giving rise to the alleged violations of the Convention occurred prior to 16   September 2022, the date on which the Russian Federation ceased to be a party to the Convention. The Court therefore decides that it has jurisdiction to examine this complaint (see Fedotova and Others v.   Russia [GC], nos.   40792/10 and 2 others, §§   68-73, 17   January 2023, and Pivkina and Others v.   Russia (dec.)