ies, as in the case of persons within their control in detention, strong presumptions of fact will arise in respect of injuries and death occurring during that detention. Indeed, the burden of proof may be regarded as resting on the authorities to provide a satisfactory and convincing explanation (see Salman v. Turkey [GC], No. 21986/93, § 100, ECHR 2000-VII, and {Cakici} v. Turkey [GC], No. 23657/94, § 85, ECHR 1999-IV).
100. In the present case, the Court observes that although the Government denied the State's responsibility for the abduction and disappearance of the applicants' relatives, they acknowledged the specific facts underlying the applicants' version of events. In particular, it is common ground between the parties that Ilyas and Isa Yansuyev were abducted from home by men in masks and camouflage uniforms armed with automatic firearms in the early morning of 13 February 2003. It has therefore first to be established whether the armed men belonged to the federal forces.
101. The Court notes that despite its repeated requests for a copy of the investigation file concerning the abduction of the applicants' relatives, the Government refused to produce it, except for several documents, referring to Article 161 of the Russian Code of Criminal Procedure. The Court observes that in previous cases it has already found this explanation insufficient to justify the withholding of key information requested by it (see, for example, Imakayeva v. Russia, No. 7615/02, § 123, ECHR 2006-... (extracts)). In view of the foregoing and bearing in mind the principles cited above, the Court finds that it can draw inferences from the Government's conduct in this respect.
102. It further considers that the applicants presented a coherent and consistent picture of their relatives' detention on 13 February 2003. The applicants, who based their account on the submission of the seventh applicant - an eyewitness to the incident in question - stated that the perpetrators had acted in a manner similar to that of a security operation. In particular, they had arrived in a group during the early morning and had searched the flat. Also, the intruders had spoken Russian without an accent. The Court further notes the applicants' arguments, none of them being disputed by the Government, that at the material time the area where the Yansuyev brothers were abducted had been under the formal control of the State, that the perpetrators could not have passed unnoticed through four federal checkpoints situated in that area, and that at that period a restriction was in place on the movement of vehicles during the night. In respect of the latter, the Court takes account of the fourth applicant's submission that she had seen the tracks of APCs after the incident (see paragraph 15 above) and a statement of Mr B., the applicants' neighbour, that he had heard the noise of engines on the night of the incident (see paragraph 46 above). In the Court's opinion, the fact that a group of men in camouflage uniforms, equipped with automatic firearms and, most probably, vehicles and able to move freely and take a person from his home in a city area presumably under the control of the federal forces and secured by federal check-points strongly supports the applicants' allegation that they were State agents. The Court also takes into account that at least for some time the domestic investigation considered that there were sufficient grounds to believe that State agents had been involved in the abduction and disappearance of the Yansuyev brothers (see paragraph 69 above).
103. The Court observes that where the applicant makes out a prima facie case and the Court is prevented from reaching factual conclusions owing to the lack of crucial documents, it is for the Government to argue conclusively why the documents in question cannot serve to corroborate the allegations made by the applica
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