The Russian Ministry of Justice has stated that it doubts the possibility of implementing the decision of the European Court of Human Rights on the Yukos lawsuit against Russia. This was reported at a session of the Constitutional Court on Thursday in St. Petersburg by Russia's plenipotentiary representative to the ECHR Georgy Matyushkin.

According to him, this request quite accurately reflects the legal grounds for the emergence of serious doubts by the Ministry of Justice regarding the possibility of enforcing the ECHR ruling.

Matyushkin justified this position by the fact that “the provisions of the Convention (on human rights) do not contain a direct prohibition on the state’s use of legal means for the lawful collection of taxes.”

He referred to one of the articles of the Convention, which refers to “the right of the State to enforce the necessary laws to control the use of property in accordance with the general interest or to secure the payment of taxes, duties and fines.”

Today, the Constitutional Court will hold a hearing on whether Russia has the right not to pay 1.9 billion euros in compensation to its former shareholders, as decided by the Strasbourg Court for violations of the European Convention on Human Rights in the Yukos case.

The Ministry of Justice doubted the possibility of enforcing the ECHR ruling on Yukos