Russia committed a series of human rights violations during its war with Georgia in 2008, the European human rights court ruled on Thursday, saying Moscow was responsible for the murder of Georgian civilians and the looting and burning of their homes.
In a historic trial, the court said the Kremlin was guilty of illegally arresting ethnic Georgians and their subsequent “inhuman and degrading treatment”. This included the torture of Georgian prisoners of war and the expulsion of Georgian villagers from their homes in South Ossetia.
The decision comes 13 years after a bitter five-day conflict in August between Russian forces and Georgian troops. The then Georgian government of Mikheil Saakashvili launched a condemned attempt to regain control of Russia’s supported South Ossetian separatist territory.
Russia responded with a large-scale invasion. He expelled Georgian forces, sent tanks to the country and bombed civilian and military targets. In evidence presented to the Strasbourg court in 2018, Tbilisi accused Moscow of presiding over a “turmoil” in Georgian villages within South Ossetia and in a nearby buffer zone.
South Ossetian forces and local militia groups were responsible for many violations, including the execution of two Georgian soldiers taken prisoner and beatings until the death of another, the court said. But it determined that Russia had effective control of the war zone as soon as an EU-mediated ceasefire took effect on August 12, 2008.
Amid international recriminations, Russia has not investigated war crimes and systematic human rights abuses, the judges decided. In addition, it prevented the return of 20,000 Georgians who had previously lived in South Ossetia and whose villages were burned to the ground, they said. Nor did he cooperate with the process, they added.
Georgia’s justice minister, Gocha Lordkipanidze, described the grand chamber’s verdict as a “historic victory”. He said he followed his country’s claim that Russia-occupied South Ossetia – or the Tskhinvali region, as he put it – was an integral part of Georgia, along with Abkhazia, another breakaway territory.
“The European court confirmed that these violations perpetrated by Russia amounted to the ethnic cleansing of Georgians during the 2008 war,” said Lordkipanidze.
Lawyer Ben Emmerson QC, who served in Georgia, said the court’s decision to release its findings the day after Joe Biden’s inauguration in Washington was not a coincidence. Biden should take a tougher approach to Vladimir Putin than Donald Trump, he suggested.
“After years of delay, the ECHR appears to be finally taking a firm stand against human rights violations in Russia,” said Emmerson.
The Kremlin will likely react furiously. He argued that the court is biased and politicized. He accused Saakashvili of starting the conflict and said his role was that of an honest peacemaker. The court on Thursday instructed both sides to present arguments about the reparations.
Putin’s response may have consequences. In 2015, Moscow said it was on the verge of withdrawing from the European human rights court, which ruled against the Russian state on several occasions.
In a separate case last week, judges ruled that Russia illegally annexed Crimea in 2014 and that the peninsula remains a sovereign Ukrainian territory. In a provisional decision, they said there was prima facie evidence that Moscow violated the rights of Ukrainians and ethnic Tatars in Crimea, with forced disappearances and torture.
In its presentation, the Georgian government said that Russian planes carried out more than 100 attacks on Georgian targets in five days. There was overwhelming evidence that Russian bombs were dropped into civilian areas, killing and injuring innocent people, he added. Evidence included testimony from witnesses, satellite imagery, and video and telephone interceptions.
Tbilisi said Russian troops invaded Georgia’s two separatist provinces, South Ossetia and Abkhazia, when the conflict broke out. Approximately 30,000 soldiers were deployed.
Before and after a ceasefire, Russian soldiers entered ethnic Georgian villages, blocking entrances and exits, he claimed. Ossetian forces and other irregular soldiers systematically set Georgian houses and entire villages on fire, he said, adding that they carried out summary executions and threatened individuals with death if they refused to leave.
Georgia claimed Strasbourg the day after hostilities ended. At a 2018 hearing, Emmerson told the judges: “It is an open secret that Russia has been lobbying publicly and privately for a favorable outcome, murmuring dark threats that it will derate the European convention on human rights and starve. the finance court if the case is against it.
“There is no middle ground to judge this case. The evidence is one-sided ”.
More than 30 witnesses testified. His testimony covered the most horrific episodes of the war: the alleged ethnic cleansing of 20,000 Georgian villagers who lived in or around South Ossetia, who were expelled and burned from their homes, a deadly rocket attack in the city of Gori and the torture of prisoners .
An Iskander SS-26 rocket exploded in Gori’s central square on August 12, 2008, killing a Dutch journalist, Stan Storimans, and 11 other civilians, the court heard. Cluster marks on the scene and shrapnel recovered from the journalist’s body identified the rocket as Russian.
However, Russian military officials who gave evidence denied that an attack had taken place. Instead, they suggested that the Georgia evidence was false or that the Georgian army bombed its own people to falsely implicate Moscow.