Second constitutional court judge says ECHR decision on Yukos should not have been contested

Russia’s Constitutional Court has published a review prepared by judge Constantine Aranovsky in connection with the decision not to implement the decision of the European Court of Human Rights in the Yukos case.

Aranovskiy supported his colleague Vladimir Yaroslavtsev who previously said that the constitutional court should never even have considered the request of the Ministry of Justice not to execute the ECHR’s decision.

The judge said that through its actions the Ministry of Justice had first made it clear that Russia agreed with the EHCR’s decision to compensate former Yukos shareholders, but then turned to the constitutional court to avoid executing them.

Aranovskiy also criticized the attitude of Russian authorities who, in their request, put forth the thesis that “legal protection under the statute of limitations is promised only to conscientious” taxpayers. Violations of the statute of limitations was one of the underlying rationales for the ECHR’s decision.

However, the judge observed that ECHR decision itself could not be considered valid, as the European Court awarded compensation to unspecified Yukos representatives, i.e. it did not specify the affected shareholders.

Earlier, judge Yaroslavtsev wrote that the Ministry of Justice’s request to look into the unenforceability of the ECHR decision should not have been considered, as it violates the principle of nemo judex in causa sua (no one should be a judge in his own cause).

On January 19, Russia’s constitutional court ruled that Russia could not implement the ECHR’s decision to compensate the shareholders of Yukos in the amount of 1.8 billion euros, as this decision contradicts the Russian Constitution.