A former singer of the Opera Theater, 89-old Evelina Gevorgyan applied to the European Court on Human Rights to restore her right for fair court investigation. Taking into account the age of the applicant, the European Court considered her case in 3-4 months.

Evalina Gevorgyan lives in a small room- 3.5 sq.m- which was supposed to be a storage room in the Choral Society.  It reminds a cell, and it is furnished with the wooden ottoman, a broken chair and a few other decrepit things.  

"My father's home was at the spot of the Moskovyan lake, currently, the Aragats café.  He also had shops in the Kirov children's park," tells the woman.

Evelina's father, a rich tradesman Yervand Gevorgyan was killed without any court decision, in 1924. Dispossession of the kulaks was followed with the pressure on the other members of the family.

Under the tyranic regime of Stalin a daughter of "enemy of people", slaughtered by the checkists, could hardly fulfill her dreams.  The path to the big stage for the 2^nd year student of Romanos Melikyan music college was disrupted in March 1942.  She was exiled to Ural. After four year, Evelina returned to Armenia and settled in Dilijan (Yerevan was closed to the returnees from exile). 

In 1957, Evelina Gevorgyan, among others, was recognized as acquitted. She applied to the authorized bodies to receive an official status of a victim of political regime.

In 2003, using the right of the victim of political regime, she applied to the former mayor of Yerevan, requesting to provide her with 400 sq.m land plot in the center of Yerevan and a long-term loan, considering the fact that before the repression she lived in the center of Yerevan.  Her request was not satisfied. She was left without real property.

"After return to Armenia, I saw that one may have harder time at homeland than at the concentrated camp," she says.

In 1994, a RA Law on Victims of Political Repression was adopted.  According to it, persons exiled from the republic should be provided with a fixed - size land property to build personal housing. Also, a long-term loan with a special law interest rate should be provided for the construction

Nevertheless, in 2006 the abovementioned article was amended.  The changes envisioned that the land plot should be provided to the victims of political repression at the place they used to live prior exile or during last three years, with the exception of the city of Yerevan.

Ms. Evelina Gevorgyan applied to the court to demand that a land plot in Yerevan be allocated to her.  She passed through all court instances, and achieving no result at home, she applied to the European court.

The court of the first instance issued a negative decision on Gevorgyan's case. In 2007, the Civil appeal court decided to satisfy partially Gevorgyan's appeal of by providing her with a building plot. However, her case was postponed due to bureaucratic procrastination until 2008. 

Lawyer Hayk Aloymyan, who defended Gevorgyan in all courts of Armenia and submitted Gevorgyan's case to the European court mentions that neither former mayor of Yerevan, or Ministry of Justice or Human Rights Defender (Ombudsman) assisted in solution of this case. "We applied to all courts to reach the justice in our country, and had to seek it in the European Court," says Aloumyan. 

The European Court requested explanations from the government of Armenia and suggested that the parties come to agreement.

"Our government represented by the Mayor of Yerevan suggested a deal and we accepted it," says the lawyer and added that a land plot of 400 sq.m in Yerevan was provided to Evelina Gevorgyan.

"This case is important not only to Ms. Gevorgyan but also to the whole legal system.  This is a lesson for legal authorities who make irresponsible decisions, hoping that before the case reaches the European court many things will change", says Hayk Aloumyan.

Ms. Gevorgyan's optimism and unbroken will to struggle resulted in victory, although she did not believe that she would be alive to see the decision of the European court.

There are 20 cases with decisions against the government of RA on violation of fair justice, these include cases which are solved in the bases of agreement among the parties, among which is this one. 

During last 7 years (from 2002 to April 2009) 1120 cases were submitted to the European Court on Human Rights, among which 291 were not proceeded. About 105 cases communications were held with the Government of Armenia, 5 of them were recognized as unacceptable, the others are in the process of discussion.

Although the dream of Ms. Gevorgyan to become famous opera singer was not realized, she, nevertheless, has sung in the Opera Theatre Choir.  Without help of the Director of the Choral Society Davit Ghazaryan, the woman would be left homeless. "Whatever happens now, notwithstanding the hard life I live, I am happy that the Soviet Union collapsed, I do not wish the former regime to come back," says Gevorgyan, calming down from the bitter memories. 

Ruzan Avoyan