ember 1996, Reports of Judgments and Decisions 1996-VI, pp. 2275 - 76, §§ 51 - 52; Akdivar and Others, cited above, p. 1210, §§ 65 - 67; and, most recently, Cennet Ayhan and Mehmet Salih Ayhan v. Turkey, No. 41964/98, § 64, 27 June 2006).
59. The Court will examine the arguments of the parties in the light of the provisions of the Convention and its relevant practice (for a relevant summary, see Estamirov and Others v. Russia, No. 60272/00, § 73 - 74, 12 October 2006).
60. The Court notes that the Russian legal system provides, in principle, two avenues of recourse for the victims of illegal and criminal acts attributable to the State or its agents, namely civil and criminal remedies.
61. As regards a civil action to obtain redress for damage sustained through the alleged illegal acts or unlawful conduct of State agents, the Court has already found in a number of similar cases that this procedure alone cannot be regarded as an effective remedy in the context of claims brought under Article 2 of the Convention. A civil court is unable to pursue any independent investigation and is incapable, without the benefit of the conclusions of a criminal investigation, of making any meaningful findings regarding the identity of the perpetrators of fatal assaults or disappearances, still less of establishing their responsibility (see Khashiyev and Akayeva v. Russia, Nos. 57942/00 and 57945/00, §§ 119 - 121, 24 February 2005, and Estamirov and Others, cited above, § 77). In the light of the above, the Court confirms that the applicants were not obliged to pursue civil remedies.
62. As regards criminal law remedies, the Court observes that the applicants complained to the law enforcement authorities immediately after the kidnapping of Abubakar Bantayev and Salman Bantayev and that an investigation has been pending since 6 January 2003. The applicants and the Government dispute the effectiveness of the investigation.
63. The Court considers that the Government's objection raises issues concerning the effectiveness of the investigation which are closely linked to the merits of the applicants' complaints under Article 2. Thus, it decides to join this objection to the merits and considers that these matters fall to be examined below under the relevant substantive provisions of the Convention.
III. The Court's assessment of the evidence
and the establishment of the facts
A. The parties' arguments
64. The applicants maintained that the men who had taken away Abubakar Bantayev and Salman Bantayev were State agents. In support of their complaint they referred to the following facts. At the material time the village of Komsomolskoye was under total control of federal troops. There had been Russian military checkpoints on the roads leading to and from the village of Komsomolskoye. The armed men who had abducted Abubakar Bantayev and Salman Bantayev had arrived in military vehicles late at night, which indicated that they had been able to pass through the checkpoints. The men had broken into the applicants' houses which had been located in the vicinity of the local military commander's office; they had acted in a manner similar to that of special forces carrying out identity checks. The applicants also pointed out that the ground given for the Government's refusal to submit the file in criminal case No. 32000 was that it contained "information of a military nature disclosing the location and nature of actions by military and special security forces".
65. The Government submitted that unidentified armed men had kidnapped Abubakar Bantayev and Salman Bantayev. They further contended that the investigation of the incident was pending, that there was no evidence that the men were State agents and that there were therefore no grounds for holding the State liable for the alleged violations of
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