The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on Wednesday rendered a decision on new applications within the framework of interstate claims received under “Armenia v. Azerbaijan”. The ECHR’s statement states that the Court has confirmed the importance of application of the interim measures for those cases and rejected the request of the Government of Azerbaijan to refute them, TASS reported.

On 3 December 2020 the Government of Azerbaijan asked the Court to suspend the proceedings on interim measures until the applicants show that they have addressed the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). They argued that the issues raised fell entirely under international humanitarian law and that some applicants had failed to properly substantiate their Rule 39 requests and their claim that there was a real danger of irreparable harm to the captives. They further requested the Court to lift the interim measure indicated on 29 September 2020 in respect of Azerbaijan. In this regard, they referred to the above ceasefire agreement of 9 November 2020. In response, the Government of Armenia asked the Court to reject the requests.

On 15 December 2020 the Court (sitting as a Chamber of seven judges) examined the requests made by the Azerbaijani Government. It noted that a very large number of Rule 39 requests, predominantly directed against Azerbaijan, continue to arrive at the Court, containing allegations that individuals have been captured and, in some cases, severely ill-treated. The Azerbaijani Government have frequently failed to provide the information requested by the Court. Moreover, the possibility to address the ICRC does not preclude applicants from seizing the Court, claiming violations of the Convention and requesting the application of Rule 39. In these circumstances, the Court did not find any basis for discontinuing or suspending the examination of requests under Rule 39 in reasonably substantiated cases concerning alleged captives.

Accordingly, the Court reaffirmed the above-mentioned general interim measure and decided to continue to examine Rule 39 requests concerning alleged individual captives, to apply Rule 39 when the circumstances merit such action and to request specific information from the respondent Government on the alleged captives. It reminded both parties of their obligation to abide by all interim measures issued pursuant to Rule 39. The Court will keep these procedures under review.