Постановление Европейского суда по правам человека от 12.02.2009 «Дело Мешаева и другие (Meshayeva and others) против России» [англ.]

the Government's explanation insufficient to justify the withholding of the key information requested by it.
95. Reiterating the importance of a respondent Government's cooperation in Convention proceedings, the Court finds that there has been a breach of the obligation laid down in Article 38 § 1 (a) of the Convention to furnish all necessary facilities to assist the Court in its task of establishing the facts.

C. The Court's evaluation of the facts

96. The Court observes that it has developed a number of general principles relating to the establishment of facts in dispute, in particular when faced with allegations of disappearance under Article 2 of the Convention (for a summary of these, see Bazorkina v. Russia, No. 69481/01, §§ 103 - 109, 27 July 2006). The Court also notes that the conduct of the parties when evidence is being obtained has to be taken into account (see Ireland v. the United Kingdom, cited above, pp. 64 - 65, § 161). In view of this and bearing in mind the principles referred to above, the Court finds that it can draw inferences from the Government's conduct in respect of the well-foundedness of the applicants' allegations. The Court will thus proceed to examine crucial elements in the present case that should be taken into account when deciding whether the applicants' relatives can be presumed dead and whether their deaths can be attributed to the authorities.
97. The applicants alleged that the persons who had taken Leoma Meshayev and Bislan Saydayev away on 17 December 2002 and then killed them had been State agents.
98. The Government suggested in their submission that the persons who had detained Leoma Meshayev and Bislan Saydayev could be members of paramilitary groups. However, this allegation was not specific and they did not submit any material to support it. The Court would stress in this regard that the evaluation of the evidence and the establishment of the facts is a matter for the Court, and it is incumbent on it to decide on the evidentiary value of the documents submitted to it (see {Celikbilek} v. Turkey, No. 27693/95, § 71, 31 May 2005).
99. The Court notes that the applicants' version of the events is supported by the witness statements collected by them and by the investigators. The applicants stated that the perpetrators had acted in a manner similar to that of a security operation - they had arrived in a large group, checked the identity documents of the residents, spoken Russian among themselves and to the residents and taken two men away along with their documents. Some witnesses also referred to the use of military vehicles such as APCs, which were not available to paramilitary groups (see paragraphs 16, 25 and 26 above). In their applications to the authorities the applicants consistently maintained that their relatives had been detained by unknown servicemen and requested the investigating authorities to look into that possibility.
100. The Government questioned the credibility of the applicants' statements in view of certain discrepancies relating to the circumstances of the arrests and the sighting of military vehicles contained in their submissions to the Court and to the domestic investigating authorities. As regards the statements made in the context of the domestic investigation, as noted above, the Government did not submit copies of the transcripts, except for the first applicant's additional statement of 23 June 2006. It is therefore unable to judge their accuracy independently. In any event, in the Court's view, the fact that over a period of several years the applicants' recollection of an extremely traumatic and stressful event differed in rather insignificant details does not in itself suffice to cast doubt on the overall veracity of their statements, especially in so far as they were supported by other independent evidenc



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