Torture and lack of effective remedy of the mother of executed Pavel Selyun

Facts

The author is Tamara Selyun, a citizen of Belarus who claims to be a victim of a violation by the State party of her rights under articles 7 and 14 (1), read in conjunction with article 2 (2) of the Covenant. Her son, Pavel Selyun was sentenced to death in 2013 on a conviction extracted by torture, and he was executed in 2014. The author claims that the authorities’ refusal to provide information about her son’s time of death and the location of his grave has inflicted and continues to inflict on her mental suffering and stress. She considers that the secrecy around her son’s execution and the refusal to hand over his body constitutes an intimidation and punishment of his family and violates her rights under article 7. She also claims that the lack of any effective remedies to request information from the domestic courts her son’s execution constitutes a violation of article 14 (1), read in conjunction with article 2 (2) of the Covenant.

Admissibility

The author’s claim under article 7 was rejected for failure to exhaust domestic remedies. This is because the author’s lawsuit was submitted to the Leninsky District Court against different State authorities, including the State Penitentiary Department. There was a lack of territorial jurisdiction and no information in the case file on whether the author had tried to submit a separate lawsuit against the State Penitentiary Department through a different court. As for the claim under article 2 (2) read in conjunction with article 14 (1), the Committee notes that the author has already alleged a violation of her rights under article 14 (1) and it does not consider the examination of whether the State party has also violated its general obligations under article 2 (2), read in conjunction with article 14 (1), to be distinct. It therefore considers this part of the author’s communication inadmissible. Lastly, the Committee considers that the author has sufficiently substantiated for the purposes of admissibility, her remaining claims concerning the secrecy around her son’s time of execution and the location of his grave, raising issues under articles 7 and 14 (1) of the Covenant.

Merits

The Committee considers that the secrecy surrounding the execution and the location of the author’s son’s grave, as well as the refusal to hand over the body for burial, have the effect of intimidating or punishing the family. The Committee concludes that these elements amount to inhuman treatment of the author in violation of article 7 of the Covenant. As for the author’s claim that the lack of any effective remedies allowing her to request information from domestic courts, the Committee concluded that there is a violation of the author’s rights under article 14 (1) of the Covenant.

Recommendations

The State party is under an obligation, inter alia, (a) to provide adequate compensation to the author for the violations suffered; (b) to release information about the burial site of her son; and (c) to hand over her son’s remains. The State party is also under an obligation to take all steps necessary to prevent similar violations from occurring in the future, in particular by amending the Criminal Executive Code with a view to bringing it into line with the State party’s obligations under article 7 of the Covenant.

Implementation

Deadline: 4 October 2022

More info on the case:

Amnesty International - Man Sentenced To Death In Belarus

Féderation Internationale pour les Droits Humains - Death Penalty in Belarus: Murder on (Un)Lawful Grounds - Oct 2016

Viasna Human Rights Center - The UN HRC found a violation of the rights of the mother of executed Pavel Selyun

European Radio for Belarus - Condemned man’s mother begs Lukashenka to save son's life

By: Irene Aparicio