FIFTH SECTIONCASE OF KRASNYANCHUK AND KOVALYOV v. UKRAINE(Applications nos. 40009/15 and 40118/15)      JUDGMENT STRASBOURG28 November 2024     This judgment is final but it may be subject to editorial revision. In the case of Krasnyanchuk and Kovalyov v. Ukraine,The European Court of Human Rights (Fifth Section), sitting as a Committee composed of: Andreas Zünd, President, Kateřina Šimáčková, Mykola Gnatovskyy, judges,and Martina Keller, Deputy Section Registrar,Having regard to:the applications lodged with the Court against Ukraine under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) by two Ukrainian nationals as listed in the appended table (“the applicants”), represented by Ms Y. Zakrevska, a lawyer practising in Kyiv, on the date indicated in that table;the decision to give notice of the applicants’ complaints under Article 3, Article 5 § 1, Article 11 and Article 13 of the Convention regarding ill‑treatment by the police and detention to the Ukrainian Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agent, Ms M. Sokorenko, and to declare the remainder of the applications inadmissible;the parties’ observations; Having deliberated in private on 7 November 2024,Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE1. The applications concern the applicants’ complaints under Article 3, Article 5 § 1, Article 10 and Article 11 of the Convention of unlawful and arbitrary arrests and ill-treatment by the police, on the dates specified in the appended table, in the context of the public order operations undertaken to deal with the series of mass protests in Ukraine between November 2013 and February 2014, commonly referred to as “Euromaidan” and/or “Maidan” (see Shmorgunov and Others v. Ukraine, nos. 15367/14 and 13 others, §§ 9-17, 21 January 2021). Allegedly, the applicants were not provided with adequate medical assistance while in detention for the injuries they had sustained, and no effective official investigation was conducted into those complaints, contrary to the above-mentioned provisions of the Convention, taken together with Article 13.2. On different dates in February 2014, June 2015 and October 2018 the authorities initiated several sets of criminal proceedings which concerned, among others, the applicants’ complaints, supported by various official medical documents, of ill-treatment by the police; inadequate medical assistance in detention; and arbitrary detention and prosecution for having taken part in the Maidan protests. In 2021 one of those sets of proceedings resulted in the conviction of a commanding police officer who had ordered his subordinates to arrest and use force against Maidan protesters, including the first applicant. According to the most recent information from the parties, in 2023 the first applicant’s compensation claim in those proceedings, after having been re-examined on several occasions, was pending before the first-instance court. Other related sets of criminal proceedings are still ongoing. The authorities have not yet identified all of the police officers who had used force against the applicants, while several commanding officers have been charged with abuse of power and illegal interference with the Maidan protests.3. On different dates between November 2016 and May 2018 the applicants were each paid lump sums of 200,000 hryvnias (UAH – the equivalent of approximately 7,000 euros (EUR) at the material time) on account of the fact that they had been injured while participating in the Maidan protests. The payments were made under the Act on State Support for the Victim Participants in Mass Actions of Civil Protest and their Family Members of 21 February 2014 and related resolutions by the Cabinet of Ministers (see Shmorgunov and Others, cited above, §§ 214-15).THE COURT’S ASSESSMENTJOINDER OF THE APPLICATIONS4. Having regard to the similar subject matter of the two applications, the Court finds it appropriate to examine them jointly in a single judgment.alleged abuse of the right of application5. The Government raised an objection that there had been an abuse of the right of application on account of the second applicant’s failure to inform the Court that in October 2018 a new set of criminal proceedings had been initiated regarding his arrest and ill-treatment (see paragraph 2 above).6. The Court notes that the material submitted by the second applicant when lodging his application with the Court in August 2015 contained sufficient information regarding the criminal proceedings that were initiated in February 2014 concerning his complaints of ill-treatment and unlawful arrest. Those proceedings, like the proceedings eventually brought in October 2018, have been ongoing. Thus, the fact that the second applicant did not inform the Court that a separate but related set of proceedings had been brought around three years after the lodging of the application cannot be construed as an intentional concealment of information from the Court, given that none of the ongoing proceedings have so far resulted in a final determination of his domestic complaints. It cannot therefore be concluded that he intended to mislead the Court or that there has been an abuse of the right of application (see G.I.E.M. S.R.L. and Others v. Italy [GC], nos. 1828/06 and 2 others, §§ 173-75, 28 June 2018, and Zličić v. Serbia, nos. 73313/17 and 20143/19, §§ 56-57, 26 January 2021). It follows that the Government’s objection must be dismissed.ALLEGED VIOLATIONS OF ARTICLE 3, ARTICLE 5 § 1 and ARTICLE 11 OF THE CONVENTION7. The applicants complained under Article 3 of ill-treatment by the police, the lack of an effective official investigation into their alleged ill‑treatment and the authorities’ failure to provide them with adequate medical assistance while in detention; under Article 5 § 1 of unlawful and arbitrary detention; and under Article 11 that they had been prevented from taking part in the protests and that they had been ill-treated, while being held in detention to that end.Admissibility8. The Government raised objections to the admissibility of those complaints, stating that they were premature because the relevant proceedings were ongoing; that the applicants had lodged compensation claims only in some of the related sets of proceedings and had not complained to the domestic authorities about specific actions by the investigators or of any inaction on their part; and that the applicants had already been paid compensation regarding their alleged ill-treatment (see paragraph 3 above).9. The Court has already examined and dismissed the Government’s similar objections in comparable cases concerning other Maidan protesters (see Shmorgunov and Others, cited above, §§ 283-86, 300-303, 397-401, 405, 416, 445, 450-54, 484 and 488). Nothing in the parties’ submissions persuades the Court to reach a different conclusion in the present case. Accordingly, the Government’s above-mentioned objections should be dismissed.10. The Government also contended that the first applicant and his lawyer had failed to appear before the investigators and courts on certain occasions. However, the case materials contain no evidence that they had been duly summoned to the relevant pre-trial proceedings. While the first applicant acknowledged his and his lawyer’s absence from some of the court hearings, they had informed the courts in advance and had clarified their complaints and legal position in the various claims, applications and appeals that they had lodged in the course of the proceedings. Overall, the Government did not demonstrate that the first applicant’s or his lawyer’s procedural behaviour had had any concrete negative implications for the conduct of the relevant proceedings or for the ability of the investigators or courts to establish and examine the relevant circumstances (ibid., §§ 304-307).11. The Court further notes that both applicants, who were granted victim status in the domestic proceedings, promptly raised their present complaints before the authorities, underwent medical examinations, were questioned by the investigators, participated in various other investigative actions, and made various procedural and substantive submissions in the course of the related pre-trial and judicial proceedings.12. In so far as the Government argued that the applicants’ complaints under Article 11 of the Convention had to be lodged within six months starting from the dates on which they had been arrested by the police (see the appended table), the Court notes that these complaints are very closely linked to the applicants’ complaints under Articles 3 and 5 § 1 of the Convention and have been the subject of the ongoing domestic investigations since February 2014. While numerous domestic and international reports identified serious shortcomings in the initial and later stages of investigations relating to the Maidan protests, there is no sufficient basis to conclude that the applicants realised, or ought to have realised, that the investigations in their cases were ineffective ab initio (see Shmorgunov and Others, cited above, §§ 301, 302 and 488). In the circumstances, the applicants, who acted diligently by cooperating with the ongoing domestic investigations, cannot be reproached for having waited until August 2015, when the proceedings were still ongoing, before lodging their applications with the Court (see Mocanu and Others v. Romania [GC], nos. 10865/09 and 2 others, §§ 279‑83, ECHR 2014 (extracts)).13. In the light of the foregoing, the Government’s objections to the admissibility of the applicants’ present complaints under Article 3, Article 5 § 1 and Article 11 of the Convention should be dismissed.14. The Court further notes that these complaints are not manifestly ill‑founded within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 (a) of the Convention or inadmissible on any other grounds. They must therefore be declared admissible.Merits15. The Court recalls that the relevant general principles have been summarised in the leading case of Shmorgunov and Others (cited above, §§ 327-36, 359-63, 459-61 and 490-94).16. In that case, the Court found violations of Article 3, Article 5 § 1 and Article 11 of the Convention regarding various instances of ill-treatment of Maidan protesters by the police; the authorities’ failure to react adequately to the applicants’ resulting medical problems; the ineffective official investigations conducted into their ill-treatment; their unlawful detention; and the disproportionate interferences with their right to freedom of assembly (ibid., §§ 337-58, 364-74, 377-91, 407-22, 425-33, 440-42, 463-78 and 495‑521).17. Having examined the material available in the present case and taking into consideration the complexity of the relevant proceedings and a certain amount of progress achieved at the domestic level (see paragraph 2 above), as noted by the Government in their observations on the merits, the Court discerns no fact or argument capable of persuading it to reach a different conclusion on the merits of the applicants’ similar complaints, which are supported by the relevant medical documents and official information from the relevant domestic proceedings.18.

Outcome for Article 3: violation