Communicated on 22 January 2018

THIRD SECTION

Application no. 41535/17 Yuriy Romanovich SHIROKOV against Russia lodged on 19 April 2017

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

The applicant is former director of an environmental NGO which had to wind up its operations in September 2015 after having been labelled a “foreign agent” (see Ecodefense and Others v. Russia , no. 9988/13 and 48 others). In November 2015 he published two reports about environmental conferences on a local website. The Russian telecoms regulator RosKomNadzor charged the applicant for publishing material without labelling its provenance from a “foreign agent” organisation. The Russian courts fined him 100,000 Russian roubles (1,300 euros) (final decision: Novosibirsk Regional Court, 27 January 2017). The hearing before the first-instance court was held in the absence of the applicant and the prosecuting party.

QUESTIONS tO THE PARTIES

1. Was there a violation of Article 10 of the Convention? In particular, did the domestic courts draw a distinction between publications on behalf of an organisation and those made by a private individual? Did they take into account the fact that the organisation had wound up its operations before the date of the publications? Did they consider whether the sanction was proportionate to the legitimate aim that the authorities sought to achieve?

2. Did the absence of the prosecuting party in all three sets of proceedings result in a breach of the impartiality requirement under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention (see Karelin v. Russia , no. 926/08 , §§ 69-85, 20 September 2016)?