yer could not have been notified about the appeal hearing. The applicant had refused legal assistance during the trial, as he had had the right to do under Article 52 of the CCP. The applicant's refusal had not prevented him from requesting legal assistance at later stages of the proceedings. Pursuant to Article 51, the authorities could have insisted on appointing a lawyer for the applicant if, among other things, he had been charged with offences punishable with more than fifteen years' imprisonment, or he had no knowledge of Russian or was mentally disabled. However, he had been charged with an offence carrying a sentence of up to fifteen years' imprisonment and thus the authorities could not override his wish to refuse legal representation. Had the applicant requested a representative, the authorities would have been obliged to appoint counsel for him pursuant to Articles 47, 50 and 52 of the CCP. Furthermore, had the applicant requested his lawyer's presence at the appeal hearing and had the appellate court disregarded it, those circumstances would have constituted an unconditional ground for quashing the appellate court's judgment. Lastly, they noted that the applicant had several previous convictions and thus had a good knowledge of the peculiarities of the pre-trial investigation and the proceedings before the courts.
29. The applicant maintained his position.
2. The Court's assessment
(a) General principles
(i) The rights to participate in the hearing and to be legally represented
30. The Court reiterates that in the interests of a fair and just criminal process it is of capital importance that the accused should appear at his trial (see Lala v. the Netherlands, 22 September 1994, § 33, Series A No. 297-A, and Poitrimol v. France, 23 November 1993, § 35, Series A No. 277-A), and that the duty to guarantee the right of a criminal defendant to be present in the courtroom - either during the original proceedings or in a retrial - ranks as one of the essential requirements of Article 6 (see Stoichkov v. Bulgaria, No. 9808/02, § 56, 24 March 2005).
31. The personal attendance of the defendant does not take on the same crucial significance for an appeal hearing as it does for the trial hearing (see Hermi v. Italy [GC], No. 18114/02, § 60, ECHR 2006-XII). In particular, proceedings involving only questions of law, as opposed to questions of fact, may comply with the requirements of Article 6, even though the appellant has not been given the opportunity to be heard in person by the appeal or cassation court, provided that he has been heard by a first-instance court (see Monnell and Morris v. the United Kingdom, 2 March 1987, § 30, Series A No. 115, and Sutter v. Switzerland, 22 February 1984, § 30, Series A No. 74). Furthermore, in appeal proceedings reviewing the case both as to facts and as to law Article 6 has been interpreted by the Court in several cases as not always requiring a right to appear in person (see, for example, Fejde v. Sweden, 29 October 1991, § 33, Series A No. 212-C).
32. At the same time the Court held on several occasions that where an appellate court has to examine a case as to the facts and the law and make a full assessment of the issue of guilt or innocence, it cannot determine that issue without a direct assessment of the evidence given in person by the accused for the purpose of proving that he did not commit the act allegedly constituting a criminal offence (see Dondarini v. San Marino, No. 50545/99, § 27, 6 July 2004; Constantinescu v. Romania, No. 28871/95, § 55, ECHR 2000-VIII; and Igual Coll v. Spain, No. 37496/04, § 27, 10 March 2009).
33. In sum, in assessing this question regard must be had to, inter alia, the special features of the proceedings involved and the manner in which the defence's interests are presented and protected before the appeal court, p
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