Rule of Law Clinic submitted amicus curiae briefs to the European Court of Human Rights in two cases: S.S. v Latvia (application no. 15408/23) and M.A. and Others v Latvia (application no. 1134/23).
The cases concern Syrian and Guinean nationals alleging mistreatment by the Latvian authorities in the vicinity of the Belarusian border. The applicants claim violent repeated pushbacks to Belarus, inhuman living conditions and obstacles in applying for international protection.
Rule of Law Clinic in its intervention argued that the Latvian domestic legislation, introduced in response to the rise in irregular border crossings from Belarus, allows to forcefully return people to a third country without formal return procedures and individual assessment of their asylum claims. The resulting arbitrary denial of fundamental rights protection to asylum seekers openly violates the Convention, particularly Article 3 (prohibition of inhuman and degrading treatment) and Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 (prohibition of collective expulsion of aliens), seriously undermining the Rule of Law.
The intervention showed that the relevant measures have resulted in protection seekers being forced to remain in the forest for prolonged periods of time in life-threatening conditions. It specifically focused on the practices of refoulment, coercion, physical and psychological violence, as well as the lack of access to basic amenities on the Latvian side of the border. It also discussed further Rule of Law issues arising from serious deficiencies in the approach, pursued by the Latvian authorities responsible for investigating non-EU nationals’ complaints under Article 3 of the Convention. Lastly, the intervention offered a brief overview of the situation in Latvia as regards to access to the border zone for independent observers and transparency of the authorities’ actions on the ground.
This submission was prepared by Aleksandra Ancite Jepifánova with the assistance of Lughaidh Kerin and Dimitry V. Kochenov.
