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11.11.09
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A Matter Of Principle
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By Roland Oliphant
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In the summer of 1999 Vadim Chuganov was drafted into the army. In the spring of 2000 he was killed in one of the most disastrous (and celebrated) battles of the second Chechen war. Now his mother is suing the Russian state in the European Court of Human rights over the Defense Ministry’s failure to pay her the compensation she was entitled to under Russian law, and this lawsuit can potentially spark an avalanche of similar appeals from bereaved families.
On February 29, 2000, the Russian General Gennady Trishev announced that the counter-terrorism operation in Chechnya was over, predicting that it would take just a few weeks to mop up the remaining “splinter groups.” The same day the sixth company of the 104th Parachute Regiment of the 76th Pskov Airborne Division found itself cut off and surrounded by rebel fighters on a hill near the southern Chechen village of Ulas-Kert.
The battle for height 776, as the encounter became known, was a military disaster. Almost the entire company – 84 out of 90 men – were killed, including all of the unit’s officers. But in the popular imagination it became a symbol of military heroism, and especially of the valor of the Russian airborne. A television series and a four-part film were spawned, and then-President Vladimir Putin later unveiled a monument to the doomed company.
One of those killed was Vadim Chuganov. His mother, Dina Chuganova, is now suing the Russian state in the European Court of Human Rights not over the incompetence of the high command, but over the failure of the Ministry of Defense to pay her the lump sum of compensation she says she was owed. According to the Kommersant daily, Chuganova’s complaint to the European Court is that the Ministry of Defense not only failed to pay her the statutory 100,000 rubles ($3,500) families of the dead are entitled to, but tried to cover up the existence of any such entitlement.
On paper, provisions for compensation to the families of servicemen killed in the course of duty are generous. Under the current law, families of those killed receive a 600,000 ruble ($20,700) lump sum, and dependents receive a pension. Those seriously wounded receive 300,000 ($10,300) plus a pension, and the less seriously wounded – 150,000 ($5,200) plus pension.
That law has only been in force since 2006, replacing a previous law guaranteeing a less generous 100,000 rubles for the families of dead soldiers. That law covered the rights of those whose sons were killed in Chechnya, and the relatives of many of those killed at Ulas Kert did receive compensation. But Chuganova says she and other families have fallen into a legal limbo that opened up when the law was changed.
Chuganova apparently first heard about the possibility of compensation from another bereaved mother in 2005. When she approached the Ministry of Defense she was told she was not allowed any compensation. In 2008, she took the case to court in St. Petersburg. But since the Federal Law “On Combating Terrorism,” which entitled her to the 100,000 ruble compensation had lapsed, and its replacement, the 2006 law “On Countering Terrorism,” had no retrospective force, she was not entitled to any compensation. A higher court in St. Petersburg declined to overturn the decision on appeal.
Chuganova’s says that the Russian state has violated her right to a fair and impartial hearing (enshrined in article six of the European Convention on Human Rights) and the clause in the second Annex of the convention that says “no individual shall be deprived of his property,” (in this case, her 100,000 rubles). She is seeking rather more than the original sum – ?1 million, or around 43 million rubles ($1.5 million).
Just because the papers have been filed does not mean that the European Court will agree to hear her complaint – it must first be established that there is a case to answer and that the plaintiff has exhausted all legal avenues in her home country. But Chuganova told Kommersant that there was a line of similarly cheated families behind her. “I have in my hand 16 sets of documents that will shortly be sent to the courts of St. Petersburg with claims for compensation,” she told the paper.
It is difficult to tell how many other families may have fallen into the same trap as Chuganova’s. The St. Petersburg branch of the human rights organization Soldiers’ Mothers did not appear to be familiar with the case when contacted Wednesday, and the Union of Paratroopers, which defends the interests of airborne troops and their families, said that Chuganova had not asked for their help. “If it’s true that Chuganov’s family did not receive any compensation, I didn’t know about it,” said Pavel Popovskikh, the chairman of the union’s central committee.
The Paratroopers Union runs its own charitable fund to support the families of deceased soldiers, which, according to Popvskiskh, has given out some 60 to 80 million rubles, although he warned that this money is “only for those members on our list who have been involved in the most recent conflicts in the Caucasus and South Caucasus.” He did not clarify whether this includes casualties of the second Chechen War, which was officially declared over in 2000.
But even if she had access to the union’s financial support, it is doubtful that Chuganova would be satisfied, since she told Kommersant that she is driven not by money but by a “thirst for justice.” |
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