The ECHR issued a decision on Wednesday regarding the execution of a court decision by Armenia in the case of a soldier Suren Muradyan who died in Nagorno-Karabakh.

The decision runs as follow:

The Deputies

1.         recalled that this case concerns the absence of an effective investigation into the death in 2002 of the applicant’s son, an Armenian military conscript, as well as the authorities’ failure to provide a plausible explanation for his injury and ensuing death;

As regards individual measures

2.         noted with interest that the investigation into the circumstances surrounding Suren Muradyan’s death has been reopened and that a number of investigative measures have been taken and urged the authorities, in view of the significant amount of time that has elapsed since the events in question, to step up their efforts to avoid as much as possible the loss of further evidence or prescription and to inform the Committee about the progress achieved in the reopened investigation by 30 June 2020, ensuring that it is compliant with the standards of the Convention;

As regards general measures

3.         noted with interest the institutional reforms aimed at ensuring the independence and promptness of investigations and victim involvement, notably the creation of the Investigative Committee; at the same time strongly encouraged the authorities to take into account the concerns and recommendations voiced by national and international human rights institutions in order to put these changes into practice in a more effective way;

4.         welcomed the legislative changes, namely the adoption of a separate article defining torture in the Criminal Code, the changes in the Criminal Procedure Code incorporating safeguards against ill-treatment, and the new Law on Pardon; invited the authorities to submit statistical data and other relevant information concerning investigations and prosecutions in respect of the new article on torture; encouraged the authorities also to fully implement the new guarantees in the Criminal Procedure Code;

5.         noted with interest the authorities’ intention to abolish the statute of limitations and to exclude any amnesty for the crime of torture and encouraged them to adopt these draft laws as soon as possible;

6.         noted also the other measures indicated, namely the concept “Citizen in uniform”, including the hotline service and the establishment of the Human Rights and Integrity Building Centre within the Ministry of Defence, as well as the Human Rights Defender’s oversight over the armed forces, and encouraged the authorities actively to pursue these reforms and to keep the Committee informed about the impact achieved in practice with a view to ensuring human rights standards in the armed forces that are in line with international standards.