European Court of Human Rights: review of the Grand Chamber judgment of 15 October 2020 in the case of Muhammad and Muhammad v. Romania (аpplication no.80982/12)

In Muhammad and Muhammad v. Romania (application no. 80982/12), the European Court of Human Rights examined the legality of limiting the right to be informed of the reasons for expulsion and the right to have access to the documents in the case file. The Grand Chamber acknowledged that these rights were not established in the first paragraph of Article 1 of Protocol no. 7 to the Convention, but noted that a foreigner would not be able to present arguments against his expulsion if he did not know the factual circumstances based on which the authorities concluded that he poses a threat to national security. This information is necessary to exercise one’s rights under the first paragraph of the article in question. The mere fact that the decision on expulsion was taken by independent judicial authorities at a high level, without it being possible to establish that the Court properly used review powers, did not suffice to counterbalance the limitations of applicants’ procedural rights. The Court also found that the limitations imposed on the applicants’ rights under Article 1 of Protocol no. 7 were not counterbalanced in the domestic proceedings and did not preserve the very essence of those rights: the courts did not examine the credibility of the findings of the Romanian intelligence service, the applicant’s lawyers did not have access to classified documents, the applicants were not informed about the possibility of having lawyers with proper access to classified information, etc. After applying the facts of the present case, the Court, therefore, concluded that there had been a violation of Article 1 of Protocol no. 7 to the Convention.

Citation: (2021) Evropeyskiy Sud po pravam cheloveka: obzor postanovleniya Bol’shoy Palaty ot 15 oktyabrya 2020 goda po delu Muhammad and Muhammad v. Romania (zhaloba № 80982/12) [European Court of Human Rights: review of the Grand Chamber judgment of 15 October 2020 in the case of Muhammad and Muhammad v. Romania (аpplication no. 80982/12)]. Mezhdunarodnoe pravosudie, vol.11, no.1, pp.3–12. (In Russian).