EHRM, 19-10-2012, nr. 43370/04, nr. 8252/05, nr. 18454/06

The country which subsequently became the Republic of Moldova was created as the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic on 2 August 1940 from a part of Bessarabia and a strip of land on the eastern bank of the Dniester (see further Tănase v. Moldova [GC], no. 7/08, §§ 11–17, ECHR 2010-…). This eastern region, now known as Transdniestria, had since 1924, together with a number of territories which are now part of Ukraine, been part of the Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. The population of Transdniestria was originally composed principally of Ukrainians and Moldovans/Romanians, but from the 1920s onwards it was subject to significant immigration by industrial workers from elsewhere in the Soviet Union, particularly Russians and Ukrainians. In a census organised by the Soviet Union in 1989, the population of Transdniestria was assessed at 679,000, composed ethnically and linguistically of 40% Moldovan, 28% Ukrainian, 24% Russian and 8% others.

According to the 1978 Constitution of the Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic, there were two official languages: Russian and ‘Moldavian’ (Moldovan/Romanian written with the Cyrillic alphabet).

In August and September 1989 the Latin alphabet was reintroduced in Moldova for written Moldovan/Romanian, which became the first official language.

On 23 June 1990 Moldova proclaimed its sovereignty; on 23 May 1991 it changed its name to the Republic of Moldova; and on 27 August 1991 the Moldovan parliament adopted the Declaration of Independence of the Republic of Moldova, whose territory included Transdniestria.

The facts concerning the armed conflict of 1991–1992 and the period up to late 2003 are set out in more detail in Ilaşcu and Others v. Moldova and Russia [GC], no. 48787/99, §§ 28–183, ECHR 2004-VII and only a summary of the key events is provided here for ease of reference. The Court notes that in their observations the Russian Government submitted that the facts concerning the armed conflict were not relevant to the issues arising in present case.

From 1989 onwards, a movement of resistance to Moldovan independence had been forming in Transdniestria. On 2 September 1990 Transdniestrian separatists announced the creation of the ‘Moldavian Republic of Transdniestria’ (the ‘MRT’). On 25 August 1991 the ‘Supreme Council of the MRT’ adopted the ‘declaration of independence’ of the ‘MRT’. On 1 December 1991 a ‘presidential election’, declared illegal by the Moldovan authorities, was organised in the Transdniestrian provinces and Mr Igor Smirnov claimed to have been elected ‘President of the MRT’. To date, the ‘MRT’ has not been recognised by the international community.

At the time of Moldova's declaration of independence, it did not have its own army. The USSR's 14th Army, whose headquarters had been in Chişinău since 1956, remained on Moldovan territory, although from 1990 onwards equipment and personnel began to be withdrawn. In 1991 the 14th Army in Moldova was composed of several thousand soldiers, infantry units, artillery (notably an anti-aircraft missile system), armoured vehicles and aircraft (including planes and strike helicopters). It had a number of ammunition stores, including one of the largest in Europe at Colbaşna in Transdniestria.

By Decree no. 234 of 14 November 1991 the President of Moldova declared that ammunition, weapons, military transport, military bases and other property belonging to the military units of the Soviet armed forces stationed in Moldovan territory were the property of the Republic of Moldova. This decree was not given effect within Transdniestria.

By a decree dated 5 December 1991, Mr Smirnov decided to place the military units of the 14th Army deployed in Transdniestria under the command of ‘the National Defence and Security Department of the Moldavian Republic of Transdniestria’. Mr Smirnov appointed the Commander of the 14th Army, Lieutenant-General Iakovlev, as head of the ‘TRM’ ‘National Defence and Security Department’. In December 1991 Lieutenant-General Iakovlev was arrested by the Moldovan authorities, who accused him of helping the Transdniestrian separatists to arm themselves by using the weapon stocks of the 14th Army. However, he was subsequently released following the intercession of the Government of the Russian Federation.

At the end of 1991 and the beginning of 1992 violent clashes broke out between the Transdniestrian separatist forces and the Moldovan security forces, claiming the lives of several hundred people.

On 6 December 1991, in an appeal to the international community and the United Nations Security Council, the Moldovan Government protested against the occupation, on 3 December 1991, of the Moldovan towns of Grigoriopol, Dubăsari, Slobozia, Tiraspol and Ribniţa, situated on the left bank of the Dniester, by the 14th Army under the command of Lieutenant-General Iakovlev. They accused the authorities of the USSR, particularly the Ministry of Defence, of having prompted these acts. The soldiers of the 14th Army were accused of distributing military equipment to the Transdniestrian separatists and organising the separatists into military detachments which were terrorising the civilian population.

In 1991–92 a number of 14th Army military units joined the Transdniestrian separatists. In the Ilaşcu judgment the Court found it established beyond reasonable doubt that Transdniestrian separatists were able, with the assistance of 14th Army personnel, to arm themselves with weapons taken from the stores of the 14th Army stationed in Transdniestria. In addition, large numbers of Russian nationals from outside the region, particularly Cossacks, went to Transdniestria to fight with the separatists against the Moldovan forces. Given the support provided to the separatists by the troops of the 14th Army and the massive transfer to them of arms and ammunition from the 14th Army's stores, the Moldovan army was in a position of inferiority that prevented it from regaining control of Transdniestria. On 1 April 1992 the President of the Russian Federation, Mr Boris Yeltsin, officially transferred the 14th Army to Russian command, and it thereafter became the ‘Russian Operational Group in the Transdniestrian region of Moldova’ or ‘ROG’. On 2 April 1992 General Netkachev, the new Commander of the ROG ordered the Moldovan forces which had encircled the town of Tighina (Bender), held by the separatists, to withdraw immediately, failing which the Russian army would take counter-measures. In May the ROG launched attacks against the Moldovan forces, driving them out of some villages from the left bank of the Dniester. In June the ROG intervened officially in favour of the separatists who were losing the city of Tighina, driving out the Moldovan forces.

On 21 July 1992 the President of the Republic of Moldova, Mr Mircea Snegur, and Mr Yeltsin signed an agreement on the principles for the friendly settlement of the armed conflict in the Transdniestrian region of the Republic of Moldova (‘the ceasefire agreement’).

The agreement introduced the principle of a security zone to be created by the withdrawal of the armies of the ‘parties to the conflict’ (Article 1 § 2). Under Article 2 of the agreement, a Joint Control Commission (‘the JCC’) was set up, composed of representatives of Moldova, the Russian Federation and Transdniestria, with its headquarters in Tighina. The agreement also provided for a peacekeeping force charged with ensuring observance of the ceasefire and security arrangements, composed of five Russian battalions, three Moldovan battalions and two Transdniestrian battalions under the orders of a joint military command structure which was itself subordinate to the JCC. Under Article 3 of the agreement, the town of Tighina was declared a region subject to a security regime and its administration was put in the hands of ‘local organs of self-government, if necessary acting together with the control commission’. The JCC was given the task of maintaining order in Tighina, together with the police. Article 4 required Russian troops stationed in the territory of the Republic of Moldova, to remain strictly neutral. Article 5 prohibited sanctions or blockades and laid down the objective of removing all obstacles to the free movement of goods, services and persons. The measures provided for in the agreement were defined as ‘a very important part of the settlement of the conflict by political means’ (Article 7).

On 29 July 1994 Moldova adopted a new Constitution. It provided, inter alia, that Moldova was neutral, that it prohibited the stationing in its territory of troops belonging to other States and that a form of autonomy might be granted to regions which included some areas on the left bank of the Dniester. According to Article 13 of the Constitution, the national language was Moldovan, to be written using the Latin alphabet.

On a number of occasions from 1995 onwards the Moldovan authorities complained that ROG army personnel and the Russian contingent of the JCC's peace-keeping force had infringed the principle of neutrality set out in the ceasefire agreement and that, inter alia, Transdniestrians had been able to acquire further military equipment and assistance from the ROG. These allegations were firmly denied by the Russian authorities. In addition, the Moldovan delegation to the JCC alleged that the Transdniestrians had created new military posts and customs checkpoints within the security zone, in breach of the ceasefire agreement. In the Ilaşcu judgment the Court found it established, by the evidence contained in the JCC's official documents, that in various areas of Transdniestria under the control of the Russian peacekeeping forces, such as Tighina, the Transdniestrian separatist forces were breaching the ceasefire agreement.

On 8 May 1997 in Moscow, Mr Petru Lucinschi, the President of Moldova, and Mr Smirnov, the ‘President of the MRT’, signed a memorandum laying down the basis for the normalisation of relations between the Republic of Moldova and Transdniestria (‘the 1997 Memorandum’). Under the terms of the 1997 Memorandum, decisions concerning Transdniestria had to be agreed by both sides, powers had to be shared and delegated and guarantees had to be secured reciprocally. Transdniestria had to be allowed to participate in the conduct of the foreign policy of the Republic of Moldova on questions concerning its own interests to be defined by mutual agreement. Transdniestria would have the right unilaterally to establish and maintain international contacts in economic, scientific, technical, cultural and other fields, to be determined by mutual agreement. The parties undertook to settle conflicts through negotiation, with the assistance where necessary of the Russian Federation and Ukraine, as guarantors of compliance with the agreements reached, and of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The 1997 Memorandum was countersigned by the representatives of the guarantor States, namely Mr Yeltsin for the Russian Federation and Mr Leonid Kuchma for Ukraine, and by Mr Helveg Petersen, the President of the OSCE.

In November 1999 the OSCE held its sixth summit at Istanbul. During the summit, 54 Member States signed the Charter for European Security and the Istanbul Summit Declaration and 30 Member States, including Moldova and Russia, signed the Agreement on the Adaptation of the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (‘the adapted CFE treaty’). The adapted CFE treaty set out, inter alia, the principle that foreign troops should not be stationed in Moldovan territory without Moldovan consent. Russia's agreement to withdraw from Transdniestria (one of the ‘Istanbul Commitments’) was set out in an Annex to the adapted CFE Final Act. In addition, the Istanbul Summit Declaration, at paragraph 19, recorded inter alia the commitment of the Russian Federation to withdraw its forces from Transdniestria by the end of 2002:

In 2002, during an OSCE Ministerial Conference in Lisbon, Russia was granted a one-year extension for the removal of troops, up until the end of December 2003.

Russia did not comply with the commitments given at the OSCE Istanbul Summit and Lisbon Ministerial Conference to withdraw militarily from Transdniestria before the end of 2003. At the OSCE Ministerial Council in December 2003, it was impossible to reach a common position on Transdniestria, and the published statement recorded that:

The Member States of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) have refused to ratify the adapted CFE until Russia has complied with the Istanbul Commitments.

In 2001, the Communist Party were successful in elections and became the governing Party in Moldova. The new President of Moldova, Mr Vladimir Voronin, entered into direct negotiation with Russia over the future of Transdniestria. In November 2003, the Russian Federation put forward a settlement proposal, the ‘Memorandum on the Basic Principles of the State Structure of the United State’ (referred to as the ‘Kozak Memorandum’, after the Russian politician, Mr Dimitry Kozak, who worked on it). The Kozak Memorandum proposed a new federal structure for Moldova, under which the authorities of the ‘MRT’ would have had a substantial degree of autonomy and guaranteed representation in the new ‘federal legislature’. The Kozak Memorandum included transitional provisions under which, until 2015, a three-quarters majority in a newly created legislative second chamber, composed of four representatives from Gagauzia, nine from Transdniestria and 13 from the new federal legislature's first chamber, would have been required to confirm federal organic laws. This would have given the ‘MRT’ representatives in the second chamber an effective veto over any legislation affecting all of Moldova until 2015. On 25 November 2003, having previously indicated his willingness to accept these proposals, Mr Voronin decided not to sign the Kozak Memorandum.

In December 2005, a European Union Border Assistance Mission was established to help combat illegal trade between Ukraine and Moldova. In March 2006 Ukraine and Moldova began implementing a 2003 customs agreement under which Transdniestrian companies engaged in cross-border trade had to register in Chişinău in order to be issued documents indicating the goods’ country of origin, in accordance with World Trade Organisation protocols. Ukraine undertook to refuse to permit goods without such export documents to pass across its border.

In what was seen as a response to these new customs measures, Transdniestrian representatives refused to continue with the 5+2 talks. Furthermore, in February and March 2005, ‘in response to the course of action taken by the Moldovan Government aimed at worsening the situation around Transdniestria’, the Russian Duma adopted resolutions asking the Russian Government to introduce an import ban on Moldovan alcohol and tobacco products; to export energy to Moldova (except Transdniestria) at international rates; and to require visas for Moldovan nationals visiting Russia, except residents of Transdniestria.

In April 2005 the Russian authorities banned imports of meat products, fruits and vegetables from Moldova, on the ground that domestic hygiene standards had not been complied with in the production of these products. Between March 2006 and November 2007 a ban was placed on importation of Moldovan wine. The International Monetary Fund found that these measures had a combined negative effect on Moldova's economic growth of 2–3% annually in 2006–2007.

In January 2005 Mr Viktor Yushchenko was elected President in Ukraine. In May 2005 the Ukrainian Government introduced a new proposal for the resolution of the Transdniestrian conflict, ‘Towards a Settlement through Democratization’ (summarized in the report of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe: see paragraph 64 below). In July 2005, citing the Ukrainian plan, the Moldovan parliament adopted a law, ‘On the Basic Principles of a Special Legal Status of Transdniestria’. Formal negotiations resumed in October 2005, with the European Union (‘EU’) and the United States of America participating as observers (referred to as ‘the 5+2 talks’).

On 20 March 1998 an agreement concerning the military assets of the ROG was signed in Odessa by Mr Viktor Chernomyrdin, the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, and Mr Smirnov, ‘President of the MRT’. According to the timetable annexed to the agreement, the withdrawal and decommissioning of certain stocks, to be disposed of by explosion or other mechanical process, was to be completed by 31 December 2001. The withdrawal (transfer and decommissioning) of surplus ammunition and other Russian military equipment and personnel not forming part of the peacekeeping forces was planned to take place by 31 December 2002 at the latest. A number of trainloads of Russian military equipment left Transdniestria between 1999 and 2002.

In October 2001 the Russian Federation and the ‘MRT’ signed a further agreement on the withdrawal of the Russian forces. Under that agreement, in compensation for the withdrawal of part of the Russian military equipment stationed in Transdniestria, the ‘MRT’ was granted a reduction of one hundred million United States dollars (USD) in its debt for gas imported from the Russian Federation, and the transfer to it by the Russian Army of part of its equipment capable of being put to civilian use.

According to an OSCE press release, 29 railway wagons carrying bridge-building equipment and field kitchens were removed from Colbaşna by the Russian authorities on 24 December 2002. The same press release quoted a declaration by the Commander of the ROG, General Boris Sergeyev, to the effect that the latest withdrawals had been made possible by an agreement with the Transdniestrians under which the ‘MRT’ was to receive half of the non-military equipment and supplies withdrawn. General Sergeyev cited the example of the withdrawal, on 16 December 2002, of 77 lorries, which had been followed by the transfer of 77 Russian military lorries to the Transdniestrians.

According to the evidence heard by the Court in the Ilaşcu case, in 2003 at least 200,000 tonnes of Russian arms and ammunition remained in Transdniestria, mainly at Colbaşna, together with 106 battle tanks, 42 armoured cars, 109 armoured personnel carriers, 54 armoured reconnaissance vehicles, 123 cannons and mortars, 206 anti-tank weapons, 226 anti-aircraft guns, nine helicopters and 1,648 vehicles of various kinds (see the Ilaşcu judgment, cited above, § 131). In 2003, the OSCE observed and verified the withdrawal from Transdniestria of 11 trains of Russian military equipment and 31 trains loaded with more than 15,000 tons of ammunition. However, the following year, in 2004, the OSCE reported that only one train containing approximately 1,000 tons of ammunition had been removed.

Since 2004 there have been no verified withdrawals of any Russian arms or equipment from Transdniestria. The Court found in Ilaşcu that, at the end of 2004, approximately 21,000 metric tons of ammunition remained, together with more than 40,000 small arms and light weapons and approximately ten trainloads of miscellaneous military equipment. In November 2006, a delegation from the OSCE were allowed access to the ammunition stores and reported that over 21,000 tons of ammunition remained stored there (see paragraph 68 below). The Commander of the ROG reported in May 2005 that surplus stocks of 40,000 small arms and light weapons had been destroyed, but no independent observer was allowed access in order to verify these claims. In their observations in the present case, the Russian Government submitted that most of the weapons, ammunition and military property were removed between 1991 and 2003 and that all that remained in the warehouses were shells, hand grenades, mortar bombs and small-arms ammunition.

The parties to the present case agreed that approximately 1,000 Russian servicemen were stationed in Transdniestria to guard the arms store. In addition, the parties agreed that there were approximately 1,125 Russian soldiers stationed in the Security Area as part of the internationally agreed peace-keeping force. The Security Area was 225 km long and 12–20 km wide.

Again, it should be noted that the Russian Government contended that events in Transdniestria prior to the schools crisis were not relevant to the issues in the present case.

In the Ilaşcu judgment the Court found it uncontested that the arms industry, which was one of the pillars of the Transdniestrian economy, was directly supported by Russian firms including the Rosvoorouzhenie (Pocboopyжеhие) and Elektrommash companies. The Russian firm Iterra had bought the largest undertaking in Transdniestria, the Râbniţa engineering works, despite the opposition of the Moldovan authorities. In addition, the Russian Army constituted a major employer and purchaser of supplies in Transdniestria.

According to the applicants in the present case, Russia accounted for 18% of the ‘MRT’'s exports and 43.7% of its imports, primarily energy. The ‘MRT’ paid for less than 5% of the gas it had consumed. For example, in 2011 Transdniestria consumed USD 505 million worth of gas, but paid for only 4% (USD 20 million). The Russian Government explained that since the ‘MRT’ was not recognised as a separate entity under international law, it could not have its own sovereign debts and Russia did not effect separate gas supplies for Moldova and Transdniestria. The bill for supplying gas to Transdniestria was, therefore, attributed to Moldova. The supply of gas to the region was organised through the Russian public corporation Gazprom and the joint stock company Moldovagaz, which was owned jointly by Moldova and the ‘MRT’. The debt owed by Moldovagaz to Russia exceeded USD 1.8 billion, of which USD 1.5 billion related to gas consumed in Transdniestria. Gazprom could not simply refuse to supply gas to the region, since it needed pipelines through Moldova to supply the Balkan States.

The applicants further alleged that Russia provided direct humanitarian aid to Transdniestria, mostly in the form of contributions to old-age pensions. The applicants claimed that official Russian sources stated that between 2007 and 2010 the total volume of financial assistance to Transdniestria was USD 55 million. The Moldovan Government submitted that in 2011 the ‘MRT’ received financial aid from Russia totalling USD 20.64 million. The Russian Government submitted that the amount of aid given to Russian citizens living in the region for humanitarian purposes, such as the payment of pensions and assistance with catering in schools, prisons and hospitals, was fully transparent, and could be compared with humanitarian aid provided by the European Union. As well as providing aid to the population living in Transdniestria, Russia provided aid to those living in other parts of Moldova.

In addition, the applicants claimed that some 120,000 individuals living in Transdniestria had been granted Russian citizenship. These included many of the ‘MRT’ leaders. The Court considers that this should be put in the context of the findings of a census carried out in 2004 by the ‘MRT Government’, which found, in the area under their control, a population of 555,347 people, approximately 32% of whom came from the Moldovan community, 30% of whom were Russian and 29% were Ukrainian, with small percentages of other national and ethnic groups.

According to Article 12 of the MRT ‘Constitution’, the official languages within the MRT are ‘Moldavian’, Russian and Ukrainian. Article 6 of the ‘MRT Law on languages’, which was adopted on 8 September 1992, states that, for all purposes, ‘Moldavian’ must be written with the Cyrillic alphabet. The ‘law’ provides further that use of the Latin alphabet may amount to an offence and Article 200-3 of the ‘MRT Code of Administrative Offences’, adopted on 19 July 2002, states that:

On 18 August 1994 the ‘MRT’ authorities forbade the use of the Latin script in schools. By a decision of 21 May 1999, the ‘MRT’ ordered that all schools belonging to ‘foreign States’ and functioning on ‘its’ territory had to register with the ‘MRT’ authorities, failing which they would not be recognised and would be deprived of their rights.

On 14 July 2004 the ‘MRT’ authorities began taking steps to close down all schools using the Latin script. At the date of adoption of the admissibility decision, there remained only six schools in Transdniestria using the Moldovan/Romanian language and the Latin script.

On 16 September 2005 the Committee on the Honouring of Obligations and Commitments by Member States of the Council of Europe (Monitoring Committee) of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) issued a report on ‘The functioning of the democratic Institutions in Moldova’. The section devoted to Transdniestria reads as follows:

In the light of this report, PACE adopted a resolution in which it resolved, inter alia, that:

In its Annual Report for 2004, the OSCE referred to events in Transdniestria as follows:

In 2004 the OSCE also observed that:

The 2005 Annual Report stated:

On the question of Russian military withdrawal, the OSCE observed:

In 2006, the OSCE reported as follows:

The Annual Report for 2007 stated:

In 2008, the OSCE observed:

In its report dated 17 June 2004, ‘Moldova: Regional Tensions over Transdniestria’ (Europe Report no. 157), the International Crisis Group (ICG) found as follows (extract from the Executive Summary):

In its report of 17 August 2006, ‘Moldova's Uncertain Future’ (Europe Report no. 175), the ICG observed (extract from the Executive Summary):

In its report entitled ‘Freedom in the World 2009’, Freedom House commented, inter alia:

The applicants sought compensation for the depression, anxiety, humiliation and post-traumatic stress disorder they had suffered as a direct result of the violation of their Convention rights. They submitted that such non-pecuniary harm could not be compensated solely by the finding of a violation. In Sampanis and Others v. Greece, no. 32526/05, 5 June 2008 the Court awarded EUR 6,000 to each applicant who had experienced anxiety, humiliation and depression as a result of his or her child being denied enrolment in school on ethnic grounds. The applicants submitted that, on this basis, they were each entitled to EUR 6,000 as a minimum in respect of the harm they had suffered as a direct result of the denial of an effective education due to their ethnicity and language. In addition, the applicants submitted that, when considering applications for damages from large umbers of victims, the Court should adopt an approach similar to that of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, which used an approximate estimation of damage suffered based on the particular combinations of facts for each class of claimant (see, for example, González et al (the ‘Cotton fields case’) v. Mexico, judgment of 16 November 2009). Thus, the applicants claimed that each applicant who was a minor at the time of the violations was entitled to an additional EUR 3,000 in respect of non-pecuniary damage. The applicant parents who were arrested, intimidated, threatened with dismissal from their jobs and deprivation of parental rights each claimed an additional EUR 5,000. All the applicants who scored over the diagnostic threshold in the Hopkins Symptom Checklist-25 for severe depression and anxiety claimed an additional EUR 5,000 each.

The Russian Government submitted that the applicants' claims were unfounded and unsubstantiated. The Court should be guided by its own case-law rather than the approach of the Inter-American Court. The events complained of took place for the most part in 2002 and 2004 and were subsequently resolved. In any event, the applicants had not provided any documentary evidence to substantiate the claims that certain among them lost their jobs, were arrested and interrogated, suffered physical violence and received warnings and threats. The Hopkins Symptom Checklist-25, which measures symptoms of anxiety and depression, was designed to be administered by health care workers under the supervision of a psychiatrist or medical doctor. When self-administered, as by the applicants, it was unreliable and proved little. Finally, in the view of the Government of the Russian Federation, the present case was not comparable to Sampanis, cited above, which concerned discrimination suffered by Greek citizens living in Greece. The Russian Federation had consistently expressed the view that applicants living in Transdniestria did not fall within Russian jurisdiction. In the event that the Court were to reach a contrary conclusion, the finding of violation would be adequate just satisfaction.

The Court recalls that it has not found it necessary or indeed possible in the present case to examine separately each applicant's claims regarding acts of harassment directed at him or her by the ‘MRT’ authorities. Moreover, the applicants' claims under Article 3 of the Convention were declared inadmissible by the Chamber on 15 June 2010. The Chamber observed that the applicants did not ‘provide any objective medical evidence’. It held that ‘the self-administered [Hopkins Symptom Checklist-25] tests are no substitute for an examination and assessment by a mental health professional' and concluded that the evidence before it did not support the view that the high threshold of Article 3 had been reached (Catan and Others v. Moldova and Russia (dec.), nos. 43370/04, 8252/05 and 18454/06, § 108, 15 June 2010).

It is clear, however, that the applicants, both parents and children, have sustained non-pecuniary damage as a consequence of the ‘MRT’'s language policy, for which the finding of a violation of the Convention does not afford sufficient redress. However, the amounts claimed by the applicants are excessive. Ruling on an equitable basis, the Court assesses the non-pecuniary damage sustained by each of the applicants at EUR 6,000.

The applicants did not submit a separate claim for the costs and expenses of the Grand Chamber proceedings. However, on 20 September 2010 they submitted a claim for the costs and expenses of the proceedings before the Chamber, including the Chamber hearing on admissibility. In that document, the applicants submitted that the complexity of the case justified their being represented by two lawyers and an advisor. The applicants' representatives had worked 879 hours on all three cases, for all 170 applicants, which in total amounted to EUR 105,480.

The Moldovan Government did not comment on the claim for costs.

The Russian Government contended that, since the applicants had not submitted any claim for costs before the Grand Chamber, none should be awarded. In respect of the claim dated 20 September 2010, the Russian Government submitted that there had been no need for so many legal representatives and that the amounts should be reduced to take account of the fact that all three applications raised identical legal issues.

Having regard to all the relevant factors and to Rule 60 § 2 of the Rules of Court, the Court makes a joint award to all the applicants of EUR 50,000 for costs and expenses.

The Court considers it appropriate that the default interest rate should be based on the marginal lending rate of the European Central Bank, to which should be added three percentage points.

We believe it is important to stress that the right under Article 8 of the Convention to respect for private and family life, in both its individual and social aspects, encompasses the right to the recognition of one's language as a component of cultural identity. Language is an essential factor in both personal development and social interaction.

The 1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child expressly provides that a child's education should be directed to respect for the identity, language and values of the country in which the child is living or from which he or she originates (Article 29 § 1 (c)).

From the standpoint of private and family life, the applicants' argument that the imposition of an alien script was aimed at undermining, and even eliminating, the linguistic heritage of the Moldovan population and in a sense forcing them to adopt a new ‘identity’ unquestionably has some force and merited separate examination. This is particularly true since the issue at stake concerns the children's intellectual development — a matter which clearly comes within the scope of private life — in a society which speaks the same language but writes it in a different alphabet. The risk of impoverishment of this linguistic and cultural identity cannot be ruled out.

A further consideration arises, likewise linked to the lives of the families and the interaction within them using their common language. Let us take the example of a letter, email or text message written by the parents in Romanian, using Latin script, to their children, who learn Romanian using the Cyrillic script: being required to write the same language in a different alphabet could conceivably, in some circumstances, give rise to difficulties in communicating.

In the instant case one cannot disregard the repercussions, on both the private and the family lives of the applicants, of the intimidation and harassment to which the pupils and their parents were subjected. It is clear from the case file that the authorities in the ‘Moldavian Republic of Transdniestria’ created a climate of intimidation such that it had a ‘chilling effect’ on the pupils, not just when it came to, say, using textbooks written in Latin script but also, more broadly, when it came to using their language within and outside school.

On 29 July 2004, for instance, the Transdniestrian police stormed Evrica School in Rîbniţa and evicted the women and children who were inside it. Over the following days police and officials from the Rîbniţa Department of Education visited parents and threatened them with the loss of their jobs if they did not transfer their children to another school (see paragraph 48 of the judgment). In our view, these actions were disproportionate and amounted to threats against the families not just in school but also at home.

There was also a series of other incidents intended purely to harass, such as the cutting of water and electricity supplies to Alexandru cel Bun School in Tighina (see paragraph 55), the failure to protect Evrica School in Rîbniţa against a systematic campaign of vandalism (see paragraph 51) and the transfer of Ştefan cel Mare School (Grigoriopol) to a village about twenty kilometres away which was under Moldovan control and to which the children had to travel by bus, being subjected to daily bag searches and identity checks at the border, sometimes accompanied by insults.

With more specific reference to the issue of checks and searches, the Court's judgment in Gillan and Quinton v. the United Kingdom (ECHR 2010) demonstrates very clearly, albeit in a different context, the dangers of arbitrariness in this sphere and the absolute necessity of putting safeguards in place (see §§ 85 and 86 of the judgment in question).

Hence, it seems clear to us that this atmosphere of intimidation affected the day-to-day lives of the families, who lived in a permanently hostile environment.

These are the reasons why we believe that there has been a violation of Article 8 of the Convention in the present case.

Furthermore, all these measures were applied systematically against the Moldovan population which uses the Latin alphabet; this leads us to the question of Article 14 of the Convention.

The applicants complained that they had been subjected to discrimination based on their language. More specifically, they maintained that the requirement to study in a language which they considered artificial caused them disadvantages in their private and family lives, and particularly in their education, not experienced by the members of the other communities in Transdniestria, namely Russians and Ukrainians. Again, this argument merited separate examination in our opinion.

We are all aware that language is the essential vehicle for education, the latter being the key to socialisation. This was aptly pointed out by the 1960 United Nations Convention against Discrimination in Education and by the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination of 21 December 1965 (Article 5 (e) (v)). Conversely, language barriers are liable to place pupils in a position of inferiority and hence, in some cases, of exclusion. The Council of Europe's 1982 report entitled: ‘Prevention of juvenile delinquency: the role of institutions of socialisation in a changing society’1. highlights the fundamental role played by school, which can be a factor not only in promoting but also in hindering integration.

In the social and political context of this case, we therefore consider that there was no objective and reasonable justification, within the meaning of our Court's case-law, for the difference in treatment to which the pupils were subjected and its potential consequences. This leads us to conclude that there has been a violation of Article 14 of the Convention.