ng or alleged killing. The Government claimed that the investigation into the kidnapping of the applicants' relative met the Convention requirement of effectiveness, as all measures envisaged in national law were being taken to identify the perpetrators.
76. The applicants argued that Abdul-Malik Shakhmurzayev had been detained by State servicemen and should be presumed dead in the absence of any reliable news of him for several years. The applicants also argued that the investigation had not met the requirements of effectiveness and adequacy, as required by the Court's case-law on Article 2. The applicants pointed out that for several years the district prosecutor's office had not questioned some important witnesses. The investigation into Abdul-Malik Shakhmurzayev's kidnapping had been opened four months after the events and then it had been suspended and resumed a number of times - thus delaying the taking of the most basic steps - and that the applicants had not been properly informed of the most important investigative measures. The fact that the investigation had been pending for more than seven years without producing any tangible results had been further proof of its ineffectiveness. The applicants invited the Court to draw conclusions from the Government's unjustified failure to submit the documents from the case file to them or to the Court.
B. The Court's assessment
1. Admissibility
77. The Court considers, in the light of the parties' submissions, that the complaint raises serious issues of fact and law under the Convention, the determination of which requires an examination of the merits. Further, the Court has already found that the Government's objection concerning the alleged non-exhaustion of domestic remedies should be joined to the merits of the complaint (see paragraph 58 above). The complaint under Article 2 of the Convention must therefore be declared admissible.
2. Merits
(a) The alleged violation of the right to life of Abdul-Malik Shakhmurzayev
78. The Court reiterates that Article 2, which safeguards the right to life and sets out the circumstances when deprivation of life may be justified, ranks as one of the most fundamental provisions in the Convention, from which no derogation is permitted. In the light of the importance of the protection afforded by Article 2, the Court must subject deprivation of life to the most careful scrutiny, taking into consideration not only the actions of State agents but also all the surrounding circumstances (see, among other authorities, McCann and Others v. the United Kingdom, judgment of 27 September 1995, Series A No. 324, pp. 45 - 46, §§ 146 - 147, and {Avsar} v. Turkey, No. 25657/94, § 391, ECHR 2001-VII (extracts)).
79. The Court has already found that the applicants' relative must be presumed dead following unacknowledged detention by State servicemen and that his death can be attributed to the State. In the absence of any justification put forward by the Government, the Court finds that there has been a violation of Article 2 in respect of Abdul-Malik Shakhmurzayev.
(b) The alleged inadequacy of the investigation into the kidnapping
80. The Court has on many occasions stated that the obligation to protect the right to life under Article 2 of the Convention also requires by implication that there should be some form of effective official investigation when individuals have been killed as a result of the use of force. It has developed a number of guiding principles to be followed for an investigation to comply with the Convention's requirements (for a summary of these principles see Bazorkina, cited above, §§ 117 - 119).
81. In the present case, the kidnapping of Abdul-Malik Shakhmurzayev was investigated. The Court must assess whether that investigat
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