"Grani" appealed to the ECHR

Grani.Ru filed a complaint about the blocking to the European Court of Human Rights.

On March 11, 2015 the Grani.ru edition reported that sent a complaint about blocking the site to the European Court of Human Rights. At the ECtHR Garry Kasparov filed a complaint about the blocking of the Kasparov.ru and Alexei websites Navalny - to block his blog in LiveJournal.

Recall that all three sites, as well as the website of the Daily Journal, were blocked in March 2014. Roskomnadzor at the request of the Prosecutor General's Office.

In the complaint to Grani.Ru, whose interests are represented in the ECHR lawyer of the "Agora" association Damir Gaynutdinov noted that site blocking violates Art. 10 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights, because it violates the right to freedom of speech. The applicants allege that the closure access to the site was not based on law and did not pursue a legitimate aim, a complete blocking of a site cannot be considered necessary in a democratic society.

The complaint says that the site was blocked without specifying specific publications, moreover, the departments did not even agree on the reasons blocking: The Prosecutor General's Office referred to calls for participation in unauthorized actions, and Roskomnadzor - to calls for extremist activities.

The site was blocked entirely out of court with referring to "Lugovoy's law".

Lugovoi's "law" itself, as the applicants note , "is so vaguely formulated that it is unusually difficult to determine in advance whether a particular publication will cause for blocking and whether the authorities will require blocking an individual publication or the entire site as a whole" . In this situation, "media editors and owners sites are virtually in no way protected from arbitrary interference" , which is contrary to the position of the ECtHR in cases of freedom of speech.

How says the publication, its complete blocking on the territory of Russia "is used to limit the dissemination of information about protest activity, opposition activity and criticism of the authorities".

Recall that in May 2014, the Tagansky District Court of Moscow dismissed the claim of the editors of the website Grani.ru, which challenged the blocking of the site. The owners of the remaining blocked resources did not achieve success either.

We believe that the blocking of all four sites in March 2014 was inappropriate.

Sources

• "Frontiers" complained to the ECtHR about the blocking // Grani.Ru. March 11, 2015