t public interest, must be established in an unequivocal manner and must be attended by minimum safeguards commensurate to the waiver's importance (see Sejdovic v. Italy [GC], No. 56581/00, § 86, ECHR 2006-II). Moreover, before an accused can be said to have impliedly, through his conduct, waived an important right under Article 6, it must be shown that he could reasonably have foreseen what the consequences of his conduct would be (see Talat {Tunc} v. Turkey, No. 32432/96, § 59, 27 March 2007, and Jones v. the United Kingdom (dec.), No. 30900/02, 9 September 2003).
2. Application of the above principles in the present case
136. Turning to the circumstances of the present case, the Court observes that upon his arrest on 5 September 2000 the applicant was interviewed by Kh.A. It appears that the interview was conducted in the absence of counsel and that the applicant denied having committed D.'s murder (see paragraphs 8 and 9 above). On the next day the applicant retained A.A., private counsel, who visited him in the police station.
137. It transpires that on 8 September 2000, that is on the day when the applicant made his confession which, he alleged, was obtained under duress, his lawyer A.A. was not able to get access to him (see paragraphs 53 and 55 above). It was not disputed between the parties that subsequently the applicant did not have access to his lawyer until 12 September 2000. In this connection the Court finds particularly worrying A.A.'s submissions, consistently made to various domestic authorities, that she was prevented from having access to her client on the days following 8 September 2000 and that the authorities in charge of the investigation into D.'s murder had intentionally misled her as to the applicant's whereabouts for that purpose (ibid.).
138. The Court further takes note of the Government's admission that the applicant's confession was obtained in the absence of his lawyer (see paragraphs 128 and 129 above). It also cannot but observe that as soon as the applicant gained access to A.A. and was interviewed in her presence on 13 September 2000, he retracted his confession, alleging that it had been obtained under duress and in the absence of legal assistance.
139. In so far as the Government argued that the lawyer's presence at the confession was not mandatory under the domestic law, the Court reiterates that it is not its role to decide in the abstract whether the applicable domestic law is compatible with the Convention or whether it has been respected by the national authorities, but to assess whether the requirements of Article 6 have been complied with (see Ringeisen v. Austria, 16 July 1971, § 97, Series A No. 13).
140. Without prejudice to its findings under the substantive aspect of Article 3 of the Convention, the Court further observes that it considered that the applicant had an "arguable claim" of ill-treatment at the hands of the police (see paragraph 111 above). Regrettably, the investigation conducted by the domestic authorities failed to elucidate the circumstances in which the applicant's confession had been obtained and the Court was afforded no means of clarifying those circumstances so as to dispel any doubts in that respect.
141. Having regard to its foregoing considerations, the parties' submissions and the materials in its possession, the Court is led to conclude that there is no indication that the applicant validly waived his right to legal assistance from 8 - 9 September 2000 onwards (see {Savas} v. Turkey, No. 9762/03, §§ 66 - 67, 8 December 2009).
142. The Court further observes that in the present case, in addition to the allegation of duress, the applicant also contended that his confession should have been excluded from the body of evidence at trial due to the absence of legal assistance at the time it was made.
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