Court
European Court of Human Rights
Decided
June 30, 2022
Docket
Application no. 42907/17; ECLI:CE:ECHR:2022:0630JUD004290717
Judge
Chamber of the First Section: Marko Bošnjak, President; Péter Paczolay; Krzysztof Wojtyczek; Alena Poláčková; Raffaele Sabato; Lorraine Schembri Orland; Ioannis Ktistakis.
Outcome
Relief granted
Disposition
Unanimously: the application admissible; violations of Article 3, of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4, and of Article 13 taken with Article 3 and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4; and “there has been a violation of Article 34 of the Convention”. EUR 30,000 to the applicants jointly for pecuniary and non-pecuniary damage and EUR 700 for costs and expenses; the remainder of the claim dismissed. The judgment became final on 14 November 2022.
Nationality
Six Russian nationals from Chechnya, a family with three children (paragraph 2). The first applicant said that he and his father had been persecuted by officers of the Kadyrov regime, who had accused them of supporting terrorism, and that he “had been arrested and tortured on several occasions” (paragraph 6).
Third country
Belarus. The family went to the crossing at Terespol again and again between February and June 2017 and was each time sent back to Belarus (paragraphs 5 to 11). On 17 July 2017 they told the Court that “they had left the area of the Polish border and returned to Russia” (paragraph 16).
From 21 February 2017 the family came to Terespol repeatedly, from April with a written application for international protection, and was refused entry each time (paragraphs 5, 7 and 8). The Court recorded: “At 10.48 a.m. on 16 June 2017 the Court (the duty judge) decided to apply Rule 39 of the Rules of Court, indicating to the Polish Government that the applicants should not be removed to Belarus until 30 June 2017. The Government were informed of the interim measure before the planned time of expulsion. The applicants were nevertheless returned to Belarus at 11.25 a.m.” (paragraph 10).
On 19 June 2017 they came back with a copy of the Court’s letter and a written application for international protection, “clearly expressed a wish to lodge this application”, and were turned away again, while a lawyer sent the application to the Border Guard by email, fax and ePUAP (paragraphs 11 and 12).
The Court held that the failure to begin any asylum procedure on “the thirty-three occasions when the applicants were at the Polish border crossing constituted a violation of Article 3 of the Convention”, and that Poland “knowingly exposed them to a serious risk of chain refoulement and treatment prohibited by Article 3 of the Convention” (paragraph 42). Their case was “an exemplification of a wider State policy of refusing entry to foreigners coming from Belarus” (paragraph 53), and Poland breached Article 34 by not complying with the interim measure.
Caution
The judgment does not record what happened to the applicants after they returned to Russia; the interim measure was discontinued on 19 July 2017 (paragraph 16). It describes twenty-four visits to the crossing between 21 February and 14 April 2017, eight more in April and May, and two in June (paragraphs 5, 8, 10 and 11), and gives the total as thirty-three (paragraph 42). Like M.K. and Others v. Poland (see that entry), the judgment concerns an official border crossing in 2016 and 2017. It does not decide the summary returns at the Belarusian border from the summer of 2021, which are before the Grand Chamber in A.R. and Others v. Poland, to be ruled on 24 November 2026.
Access to asylum
Pushbacks
Chain refoulement
Collective expulsion
Effective remedy
Interim measures
Article 3 ECHR
Article 34 ECHR
The court's own text
Public copy
Read in full in the English text on HUDOC (item 001-218070) on 8 November 2026.
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