es, whilst, in the Government's submission, none of their neighbours had seen the perpetrators and had learnt of the abduction of the applicant's son the next morning from his relatives.
55. The Government also pointed out to the alleged contradictions between the applicant's account of the events of 10 April 2003 submitted to the Court and her statements concerning the incident made to the domestic authorities. In particular, whilst in her submissions to the Court the applicant claimed that the alleged perpetrators had arrived in a group of twenty persons in a khaki UAZ vehicle, a grey UAZ off-road vehicle and a grey bus with a blue stripe, in her witness interview to the domestic authorities the applicant stated that there had been around ten alleged perpetrators who had been driving a grey UAZ vehicle, a UAZ vehicle and a Gazel minibus. In the Government's opinion, such discrepancies indicated that the applicant was pursuing an aim of discrediting the Russian federal forces, persuading the Court of their involvement in the abduction and of receiving monetary compensation for the alleged violations.
56. Lastly, the Government submitted that groups of Ukrainian or ethnic Russian mercenaries had participated in the armed conflict together with Chechen rebel fighters and committed crimes in the territory of the Chechen Republic; thus, the fact that the perpetrators had Slavic features and spoke Russian could not prove their attachment to the Russian military. The Government also alleged that a considerable number of weapons had been stolen by illegal armed groups from Russian arsenals in the 1990s and that anyone could purchase masks, camouflage uniforms and firearms.
(b) The Court's assessment
57. The Court reiterates that, in the light of the importance of the protection afforded by Article 2, it 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. It has held on many occasions that where an individual is taken into police custody in good health and is found to be injured on release, it is incumbent on the State to provide a plausible explanation of how those injuries were caused. The obligation on the authorities to account for the treatment of an individual within their control is particularly stringent where that individual dies or disappears thereafter (see, among other authorities, Orhan v. Turkey, No. 25656/94, § 326, 18 June 2002, and the authorities cited therein). Where the events in issue lie wholly or in large part within the exclusive knowledge of the authorities, as in the case of persons under 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).
58. In the present case, the Court observes that although the Government denied that the State was responsible for the abduction and disappearance of the applicant's son, they acknowledged the specific facts underlying the applicant's version of events. In particular, it is common ground between the parties that Mr Khanpasha Dzhabrailov was abducted from his home by men in masks and camouflage uniforms armed with automatic firearms in the early morning of 10 April 2003. It has therefore first to be established whether the armed men belonged to the federal armed forces.
59. The Court notes at the outset that despite its repeated requests for a copy of the investigation file concerning the abduction of Mr Khanpasha Dzhabrailov the Government refused to produce it, referring to Article 161 of the Russian Code of Criminal Procedure. The C
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