The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has delivered a unanimous ruling stating that Ukraine breached the right to privacy of three Ukrainian nationals and their legal representative by instituting unauthorized surveillance practices. The ruling emphasizes that these measures contravened Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
This decision comes in response to the secret surveillance activities authorized by Ukrainian authorities, which encompassed wiretapping and video monitoring without substantiated official requests. These intrusive measures targeted public officials accused of corruption, and the Ukrainian government’s refusal to provide documentation for these actions has been particularly criticized by the ECHR.
The ruling further underscores the infringement on the professional secrecy of the applicants’ lawyer, whose communications with clients were also intercepted. The ECHR has admonished that covert surveillance impinging on attorney-client conversations must be strictly regulated to meet the thresholds of legality, clarity, and precision.
The court also reproved Ukraine for its failure to cooperate during proceedings by withholding crucial information that impeded the applicants from challenging the investigative actions effectively, thereby violating Article 38 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Consequently, Ukraine has been ordered to compensate two of the applicants with 6,000 euros in damages, as specified under Article 41 of the Convention.
The complainants in this case include Stanislav Fedorovych Denysyuk, Mykhaylo Mykhaylovych Beylin, Maksym Stanislavovych Berezkin, and their defense lawyer, Nazar Stepanovych Kulchytskyy. All individuals were subjected to unendorsed investigative operations, prompting them to lodge a complaint with the ECHR in 2019, citing violations of Articles 8, 13, and 38 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
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