On 4 October 2018 the European Court of Human Rights published its decision on the case of “Petrosyan v. Armenia” (application no. 2126/13). Sitting as a Committee, the Court declared the application inadmissible.
The applicant complained that the domestic authorities had violated her right of access to a court under Article 6 of the Convention (right to a fair trial) as she had been deprived of the opportunity to appeal against the District Court’s judgment. The applicant alleged that the Court of Appeal made artificial restraints during accepting the appeal. The applicant demanded to oblige the Government of RA to pay 250,000 EUR in respect of pecuniary damage, 50,000 EUR in respect of non-pecuniary damage and 1,500,000 AMD for costs and expenses.
The Court confirmed the fact, that the Court of Appeal declared the applicant’s appeal inadmissible and gave a two-week time-limit in order to eliminate the shortcomings and to resubmit the appeal. The Court of Appeal declared the applicant’s resubmitted appeal inadmissible again, on the basis that she had failed to attach to her appeal proof that she had notified all other parties to the proceedings.
The Court observed that, in the case file submitted to the Court, there was no evidence to support the applicant’s allegation. On the contrary, the Government have submitted to the Court a document which clearly showed that the applicant hadn’t requested the domestic court to be provided with a list containing the names of other parties to the proceedings but she requested only to give her permission to consult the case file.
The European Court decided that the application is manifestly ill-founded within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 (a) of the Convention and must therefore be declared inadmissible pursuant to Article 35 § 4 of the Convention.
