CONTENTS
RES JUDICATA
Case Commentary on the Judgment of the ICJ issued on 3 February 2015
Jason Morgan-Foster
On 3 February 2015, the International Court of Justice rendered its Judgment on the merits in the Croatia v. Serbia case, completing the final chapter in its twenty-two year consideration of allegations of State responsibility for genocide arising out of the dispute in the Balkans. The Court had to determine whether it had jurisdiction to rule on Croatia’s claim in respect of events alleged to have taken place before 27 April 1992 – the date when the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia came into existence as a separate State and became party to the Genocide Convention – a question which had been reserved in the 2008 Judgment on preliminary objections.
Case Commentary on the Judgment (Grand Chamber) of the ECHR issued on 16 June 2015
Maria Suchkova
In Delfi AS v. Estonia the majority of the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights confirmed the conclusion made by the Chamber of the European Court in its judgment of 10 October 2013 that holding an online news portal responsible for moral damage done to third parties as a result of the publication of offensive comments by users in the portal's comment environment may not entail a violation of Article 10 of the Convention.
Case Commentary on the Judgment (Grand Chamber) of the ECHR on 16 September 2014
Vera Rusinova
In the Judgment Hassan v. The United Kingdom the European Court of Human Rights reviewed its approach to the correlation between international humanitarian law and the Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in the fields of right to liberty and legality of derogation from obligations under this Convention outside the procedure set forth in Article 15.
KHOROSHENKO V. RUSSIA: BLIND RENDEZVOUS
Case Commentary on the Judgment (Grand Chamber) of the ECHR issued on 30 June 2015
Oleksandr Yevsieiev
In this article the judgment of the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights in respect to a complaint of a Russian citizen A. Khoroshenko, where the applicant appealed the restriction of family visits for those who are serving a life sentence in prison, is analyzed.
EX OFFICIO
Press Release issued by the Registrar of the ECHR on 5 June 2015
RIGHT TO LIFE AND THE “AUTONOMY OF THE INDIVIDUAL”
Case Commentary on the Judgment (Grand Chamber) of the ECHR issued on 5 June 2015
Anatoliy Kovler
The recent Judgment of the European Court of Human Rights on the well-known case of Lambert, which raised the problem of ceasing treatment of paralyzed patient due to «unreasonable obstinacy» is critically analyzed. In this case, the collision of two rights: the right to protection of the patient’s life by the state and the will of the patient, allegedly expressed in other circumstances, about the undesirability of prolonging the agony. The problem was compounded by the uncertainty of the national law.
JUS GENTIUM
CONTINENTAL SHELF BEYOND 200 MILES: DETERMINATION OF THE OUTER LIMITS AND DELIMITATION (PART 1)
Roman Kolodkin and Sergey Punzhin
Both the State practice and the case law of international dispute resolution bodies examined in the present article demonstrate that the delimitation of the continental shelf beyond 200 nautical miles by an international court or arbitral tribunal is possible only if this delimitation does not prejudice the Commission’s functions nor ignore its role in the determination of the outer limits of such a continental shelf.
LEX MERCATORIA
APPLICATION OF BILATERAL INVESTMENT TREATIES BY RUSSIAN COURTS
Ilya Rachkov
Russia concluded almost 80 bilateral investment treaties (BITs). However, in 1992–2015 Russian courts (primarily arbitrazh court, but also the Supreme Court and the Constitutional Court) applied only 11 BITs in 22 judgments. These examples show that both the parties to disputes and the courts did not discover the potential of BITs as an instrument of protection of foreign investments on the national level.
FORUM INCOGNITA
Grigory Vaypan
There is another international human rights protection body knocking at the door of the Russian legal order – the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. To be more precise, there is a Russian citizen who is knocking at the doors of Russian courts trying to enforce a decision by such a body finding his deprivation of liberty arbitrary.
Artur Gulasaryan
The UN Compensation Commission was established under the UN Security Council Resolution 692 (1991). The author analyzes the specific features of the Commission and its functional outcomes. Special attention is drawn to the Follow-up Programme for Environmental Awards established by the Governing Council of the Commission in 2005 to monitor both financial and technical implementation of environmental projects undertaken by the claimant governments in accordance with the awarded funds in order to ensure their financial transparency and technical compliance with the recommendations of the F4 Panel.
OPINIO JURIS
Vladislav Starzhenetskiy
Provisional application of international treaties never attracted much attention of the Russian scholars and practitioners. The author analyzes the award of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in Yukos case, different views on the interpretation of Article 45(1) of the Energy Charter Treaty, recent decisions of the Russian Constitutional Court on provisional application of treaties and makes recommendations how to improve situation with provisional application of treaties in Russia.
LIBRORUM
PROTECTION OF VICTIMS IN ARMED CONFLICTS:IN SEARCH OF AN INTEGRATED APPROACH
Gleb Bogush
Book review: Rusinova V. N. Prava cheloveka v vooruzhionnykh konfliktakh: problemy sootnosheniya norm mezhdunarodnogo gumanitarnogo prava i mezhdunarodnogo prava prav cheloveka. M.: Statut, 2015. – 368 s.
A new book by Vera Rusinova deals with the dual application of international humanitarian law and international human rights law in armed conflicts.
EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS: CONSENSUS AS A BASIS FOR JUDICIAL FINDINGS
Olga Chernishova
Book review: Dzehtsiarou К. European Consensus and the Legitimacy of the European Court of Human Rights. Cambridge University Press, 2015. – 229 pp.
A new book by К. Dzehtsiarou published by Cambridge University Press describes in detail European consensus as a tool of interpretation of the European Convention on Human Rights.
IN MEMORIAM
Gleb Bogush
The essay is dedicated to the passing of Professor Otto Triffterer, an outstanding scholar in the field of international criminal law, who made a significant contribution to the development of this branch of international law.