FIFTH SECTIONCASE OF MOLCHENKO AND PAVLENKO v. UKRAINE(Applications nos. 64639/19 and 64649/19)    JUDGMENT This version was rectified on 5 March 2021under Rule 81 of the Rules of Court    STRASBOURG25 February 2021 This judgment is final but it may be subject to editorial revision.In the case of Molchenko and Pavlenko v. Ukraine,The European Court of Human Rights (Fifth Section), sitting as a Committee composed of: Ivana Jelić, President, Ganna Yudkivska, Arnfinn Bårdsen, judges,and Liv Tigerstedt, Acting Deputy Section Registrar,Having deliberated in private on 4 February 2021,Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:PROCEDURE1. The case originated in applications against Ukraine lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on the various dates indicated in the appended table.2. The applicants were represented by Mr S. Kulbach, a lawyer practising in Limoges. The applicant in the application no. 64639/19 was also represented by Ms Y. Zhukova, practising in Dnipro.3. The Ukrainian Government (“the Government”) were given notice of the applications.THE FACTS4. The list of applicants and the relevant details of the applications are set out in the appended table.5. The applicants complained of the inadequate conditions of their detention and of the lack of any effective remedy in domestic law.THE LAWJOINDER OF THE APPLICATIONS6. Having regard to the similar subject matter of the applications, the Court finds it appropriate to examine them jointly in a single judgment.ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLES 3 AND 13 OF THE CONVENTION7. The applicants complained of the inadequate conditions of their detention and that they had no effective remedy in this connection. They relied on Articles 3 and 13 of the Convention, which read as follows:Article 3“No one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”Article 13“Everyone whose rights and freedoms as set forth in this Convention are violated shall have an effective remedy before a national authority ...”8. The Court notes that the applicants were kept in detention in poor conditions. The details of the applicants’ detention are indicated in the appended table. The Court refers to the principles established in its case‑law regarding inadequate conditions of detention (see, for instance, Muršić v. Croatia [GC], no. 7334/13, §§ 96‑101, ECHR 2016). It reiterates in particular that a serious lack of space in a prison cell weighs heavily as a factor to be taken into account for the purpose of establishing whether the detention conditions described are “degrading” from the point of view of Article 3 and may disclose a violation, both alone or taken together with other shortcomings (see Muršić, cited above, §§ 122 ‑141, and Ananyev and Others v. Russia, nos. 42525/07 and 60800/08, §§ 149‑159, 10 January 2012).9. In the leading case of Melnik v. Ukraine (no. 72286/01, 28 March 2006; for more recent case-law see Beketov v. Ukraine [Committee], no. 44436/09, 19 February 2019) the Court already found a violation in respect of issues similar to those in the present case.10. Having examined all the material submitted to it, the Court has not found any fact or argument capable of persuading it to reach a different conclusion on the admissibility and merits of these complaints. Having regard to its case-law on the subject, the Court considers that in the instant case the applicants’ conditions of detention were inadequate.11. The Court further notes that the applicants did not have at their disposal an effective remedy in respect of these complaints.12.

Article of the Convention at issue: Article 3
Outcome: violation