The European Court by investigating cases and making decisions against RA from time to time reminds us that along with the image that we have about justice and court system, there are also real courts. The Court by its activity demonstrates that human rights are not abstract. Human rights defense can be very material, as it presented in the decisions of the European Court," believes Vahe Grigoryan.

During last eight years about 1500 applications were submitted to the European Court from Armenia, and 20 decisions were made.  By the way, 9 out of 20 decisions were adopted in 2009, and the government won only one case.

The applications submitted to the European Court had thematic character. Since 2004, the first big flow of applications were about issues on administrative arrest. 

On civil cases, many of the applications were about the Northern Avenue and the Main Avenue.  In 2005-2007, many cases were on preliminary detention.

The last group of complaints were about court cases on March 1 events. This trends were mentioned by lawyer Ara Ghazaryan.

In 2010, we expect the European Court's decisions on cases regarding the Northern Avenue and the Main Avenue. The majority of these cases are in the last stage of investigation. There is also a precedent for these cases.

According to Ara Ghazaryan, the decision of the European Court on the case "Minasyan and Semirjan vs. the Republic of Armenia" can serve as a precedent for more than ten cases investigated currently in the European Court.

"In this decision, the European Court confirmed that alienation of the property did not happen according to the law. The whole process of the alienation and calculation of the compensation was  based not on the law but on the governmental decisions.  This was the most important commentary. "

Ara Ghazaryan says that the European Court's commentary is also important for the issue of recognition of property right. The European Court, in fact, did not accept the governmental interpretation, according to which there was no alienation of the property, it was just that the state simply "took" the land belonging to it.

Lawyer Vahe Grigoryan also thinks that the majority of the decision on cases on property right will be made in 2010.  According to him, although the cases have their peculiarities, they are based on the same issue.

"The cases regarding the approach of the RA government and courts are similar.  People lost their property based on legal acts contradicting the Constitutions, and they are similar in the sense that their property rights were violated. "

Lousine Manoukyan