CEDH · PRESS;CHAMBERJUDGMENTS;ENG — 23 juin 2009

.s800EAC49 { font-size:12pt } .sFE10DC93 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:center } .s29100277 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold } .s40F41F73 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:right } .s32563E28 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial } .s7ED160F0 { text-decoration:none } .s653E6C45 { font-family:Arial; font-size:6.67pt; vertical-align:super; color:#0069d6 } .s4DDA3AA3 { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; font-style:italic } .s3DC36BA9 { font-family:Arial; text-decoration:underline; color:#0069d6 } .sA36B60A1 { font-family:Arial; font-style:italic } .sCB9E0544 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; text-align:left } .sC7EAD8B { font-family:Arial; font-weight:bold; text-decoration:underline } .sF6A12959 { width:33%; height:1px; text-align:left } .s2EB42ED2 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; font-size:10pt }   502 23.06.2009   Press release issued by the Registrar   CHAMBER JUDGMENT MINASYAN AND SEMERJYAN v. ARMENIA   The European Court of Human Rights has today notified in writing its Chamber judgment [1] in the case of Minasyan and Semerjyan v. Armenia (application no. 27651/05). The case concerned the demolition of the applicants’ flat for State construction projects.   The Court held unanimously that there had been a violation of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (protection of property) to the European Convention on Human Rights, on account of the fact that the applicants had been deprived of their flat without a lawful basis.   The Court held that the question of the application of Article 41 (just satisfaction) was not yet ready for decision. ( The judgment is available only in English .)   1.     Principal facts   The applicants, Nelli Minasyan and Yelena Semerjyan, mother and daughter, were born in 1960 and 1990 respectively and live in Los Angeles, the United States of America. The first applicant was the owner of a flat in an apartment building situated on a plot of land owned by the State in Yerevan. The parties disagreed as to whether the second applicant enjoyed a right of use of the flat.   Several decrees related to expropriation were adopted by the Government between 2001 and 2004. In July 2004, a private company, Glendale Hills CJSC, and the Yerevan Mayor’s Office signed an agreement which authorised the company to negotiate directly with the owners of the property subject to expropriation and to institute court proceedings on behalf of the State seeking forced expropriation if related negotiations failed.   In December 2004, Glendale Hills CJSC offered Nelli Minasyan 7,000   United   States   Dollars   (USD) (the equivalent of approximately 5,000   euros   (EUR)) compensation for expropriating her flat and an additional USD   6,720 (the equivalent of approximately EUR   4,800) financial incentive if she agreed to hand it over within five days. Her daughter was offered separately USD   3,500 as compensation and financial incentive.   The applicants rejected the offer as a result of which the company, on behalf of the State, brought court proceedings against them. The courts found against the applicants; they based their findings in particular on the Civil Code, following which their flat was destroyed.   2.     Procedure and composition of the Court   The application was lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 1 July 2005 and was examined for admissibility and merits at the same time.   Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:   Josep Casadevall (Andorra), President , Elisabet Fura-Sandström (Sweden), Boštjan M. Zupančič (Slovenia), Alvina Gyulumyan (Armenia), Ineta Ziemele (Latvia), Luis López Guerra (Spain), Ann Power (Ireland), judges ,   and Stanley Naismith, Deputy Section Registrar .   3.     Summary of the judgment [2]   Complaints   Relying in particular on Article 1 of Protocol No. 1, the applicants complained of the expropriation and demolition of their flat in Yerevan.   Decision of the Court   The Court first considered it established that the second applicant enjoyed the right of use of the flat, and found that the termination of the first applicant’s ownership and the second applicant’s right of use amounted to a deprivation of their possessions. It then reiterated that the first and most important requirement of Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 was that any interference by a public authority with the peaceful enjoyment of possessions, including deprivation of property, should be lawful.   As regards the first applicant, no law on expropriation of property had ever been adopted by the Armenian Parliament; instead, the whole expropriation process had been governed by a number of Government decrees. In view of the fact that Article 28 of the Armenian Constitution, as interpreted by the Constitutional Court, required that expropriation of property be carried out on the basis of a statute adopted by Parliament and not just governmental decrees, the expropriation had not been carried out in compliance with conditions provided for by law.   In respect of the second applicant, the domestic courts had terminated her right of use of the flat in question on the basis of the Civil Code, despite the fact that such termination had only been possible upon the request of the owner. The Civil Code had made no mention of applications lodged by any person other than the owner, be it the State, or like in the applicants’ case, a private company on behalf of the State. Accordingly, the second applicant’s right of use had been terminated arbitrarily by relying on rules that had not been applicable to her case.   Consequently, the Court held that both applicants’ deprivation of their possessions had been incompatible with the principle of lawfulness, in violation of Article 1 of Protocol   No.   1.     ***   The Court’s judgments are accessible on its Internet site ( http://www.echr.coe.int ).   Press contacts Stefano Piedimonte (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 90 21 42 04) Tracey Turner-Tretz (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 88 41 35 30) Paramy Chanthalangsy (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 88 41 28 30) Kristina Pencheva-Malinowski (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 88 41 35 70) Céline Menu-Lange (telephone : 00 33 (0)3 90 21 58 77)   The European Court of Human Rights was set up in Strasbourg by the Council of Europe Member States in 1959 to deal with alleged violations of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights. [1] Under Article 43 of the Convention, within three months from the date of a Chamber judgment, any party to the case may, in exceptional cases, request that the case be referred to the 17 ‑ member Grand Chamber of the Court. In that event, a panel of five judges considers whether the case raises a serious question affecting the interpretation or application of the Convention or its protocols, or a serious issue of general importance, in which case the Grand Chamber will deliver a final judgment. If no such question or issue arises, the panel will reject the request, at which point the judgment becomes final. Otherwise Chamber judgments become final on the expiry of the three-month period or earlier if the parties declare that they do not intend to make a request to refer. [2] This summary by the Registry does not bind the Court.