issued by the Registrar of the Court

ECHR 196 (2023)

27.06.2023

Violation of Greenpeace Arctic activists’ rights after protest at Russian offshore

oil-drilling platform

In today’s Chamber judgment¹in the case of Bryan and Others v. Russia (application no. 22515/14)

the European Court of Human Rights held, unanimously, that there had been:

a violation of Article 5 § 1 (right to liberty and security) of the European Convention on Human

Rights, and

a violation of Article 10 (freedom of expression).

The case concerned a protest in 2013 by 30 Greenpeace activists at the Russian offshore oil-drilling

platform Prirazlomnaya.

The protest had involved two of the activists climbing the Prirazlomnaya platform after launching

dinghies from a vessel called the Arctic Sunrise, which had been sailing under the flag of the

Netherlands. The Russian coastguard had subsequently intercepted the vessel and towed it to the

port of Murmansk, with the activists on board. On arriving at Murmansk the activists had been

arrested and their detention ordered on charges of piracy. The charges had later been reclassified to

hooliganism, and the proceedings against them discontinued under an amnesty.

Firstly, the Court examined various aspects related to jurisdiction and decided that it could deal with

the case. In particular, despite the compensation the activists had received as a result of a

settlement agreement reached by the Netherlands and Russia over the incident – after arbitration

proceedings under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea – there had been no

acknowledgment by Russia of a breach of the activists’ rights and they could therefore still claim to

be victims of a violation of the European Convention.

Next the Court found that the period during which the Arctic Sunrise had been under Russian control

and up until its arrival in Murmansk had amounted to a deprivation of the activists’ liberty. That

period of detention had been completely unrecorded and had therefore amounted to a grave

violation of their Article 5 rights.

Although the activists’ detention after that and up until their release two months later had been

officially recorded, it had been arbitrary as there had been confusion over what charges to bring

against them and the reasons for their detention.

Lastly, the Court found that their detention had amounted to an interference with their freedom to

express their opinion on a matter of significant environmental interest which had not been

prescribed by national law.

Principal facts

The 30 applicants in the case are Argentinian, Australian, Brazilian, British, Canadian, Danish, Dutch,

Finnish, French, Italian, New Zealand, Polish, Russian, Swedish, Swiss, Turkish, Ukrainian, and United

1. Under Articles 43 and 44 of the Convention, this Chamber judgment is not final. During the three-month period following its delivery,

any party may request that the case be referred to the Grand Chamber of the Court. If such a request is made, a panel of five judges

considers whether the case deserves further examination. In that event, the Grand Chamber will hear the case and deliver a final

judgment. If the referral request is refused, the Chamber judgment will become final on that day.

Once a judgment becomes final, it is transmitted to the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe for supervision of its execution.

Further information about the execution process can be found here: www.coe.int/t/dghl/monitoring/execution.

States of America nationals. They are all Greenpeace activists, and include a Greenpeace press

officer and two freelance journalists.

Greenpeace has staged a number of peaceful protests at sea since 2010 to campaign against

offshore oil-drilling.

In September 2013, the applicants travelled to the Pechora Sea (within the exclusive economic zone

of Russia) on board the Arctic Sunrise, which was sailing under the flag of the Netherlands, in the

vicinity of the Russian Prirazlomnaya offshore oil-drilling platform. The applicants informed the

platform’s management, Gazprom, and the Russian coastguard that they intended to scale the

Prirazlomnaya and set up a survival capsule where they would stay until Gazprom dropped its plans

to drill for oil in the Arctic.

In the event, following the launching of dinghies from the Arctic Sunrise, two of the activists climbed

the platform on 18 September 2013 but were forced back down by water cannon. They were picked

up by the Russian coastguard and taken to its vessel, the Ladoga, while the remaining activists

returned to the Arctic Sunrise by dinghy.

The next day armed agents of the Russian Federal Security Service boarded the Arctic Sunrise from a

helicopter and took control of the vessel and its crew. Later that day the two activists caught scaling

the Prirazlomnaya were transferred from the Ladoga to the Arctic Sunrise.

The Arctic Sunrise was then towed to the port of Murmansk (Russia) by the Russian coastguard,

between 20 and 24 September 2013. On arrival at Murmansk, the applicants were officially arrested,

and the district court authorised their detention for two months pending criminal proceedings

against them for piracy. Furthermore, it ruled that the start of the applicants’ pre-trial detention was

24 September 2013.

The regional court upheld that finding on appeal. It also upheld the applicants’ detention orders,

dismissing their arguments that there were no grounds for bringing piracy charges since the

Prirazlomnaya was clearly not a vessel.

A month later, however, the investigating authorities amended the charges to hooliganism as they

found that the Prirazlomnaya was not a vessel but a port facility, thus ruling out criminal liability for

piracy.

The applicants were released on bail on various dates between 20 and 29 November 2013. Shortly

after that the criminal proceedings against them were discontinued under an amnesty.

In the meantime, there had been arbitration proceedings under the United Nations Convention on

the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) between the Government of the Netherlands, as the country of the

Arctic Sunrise’s flag, and the Russian Federation, which refused to participate in those proceedings,

citing lack of jurisdiction of the arbitral tribunal over it. The Netherlands was awarded 5.4 million

euros (EUR), including compensation for the applicants, which Russia refused to pay.

Eventually, however, the two States reached a confidential settlement agreement, and

EUR 2,7 million was transferred by the Netherlands to Greenpeace of which the applicants received

EUR 605,000 (about EUR 20,000 each).

Complaints, procedure and composition of the Court

Relying on Article 5 (right to liberty and security) and Article 10 (freedom of expression), the

applicants complained that their arrest and pre-trial detention had been arbitrary and illegal and

that the Russian authorities had unlawfully interfered with their freedom of expression.

The application was lodged with the European Court of Human Rights on 17 March 2014.

The Governments of the Netherlands, Sweden and Ukraine, as well as two non-governmental

organisations, the Media Legal Defence Initiative and ARTICLE 19, were granted leave to intervene in

the written procedure and submitted comments. The Governments of Denmark, Finland, France,

Italy, Poland, Switzerland, Türkiye and the United Kingdom, whose nationals were among the

applicants, were informed of their right to intervene in the proceedings before the Court but they

did not submit any comments as to the admissibility and merits of the application.

The Court’s procedure for processing of applications against Russia can be found here.

Judgment was given by a Chamber of seven judges, composed as follows:

Pere Pastor Vilanova (Andorra), President,

Jolien Schukking (the Netherlands),

Yonko Grozev (Bulgaria),

Georgios A. Serghides (Cyprus),

Peeter Roosma (Estonia),

Ioannis Ktistakis (Greece),

Andreas Zünd (Switzerland),

and also Olga Chernishova, Deputy Section Registrar.

Decision of the Court

The Court decided on various aspects related to jurisdiction in the applicants’ case.

Firstly, the Russian authorities had had full and exclusive control over the Arctic Sunrise and its crew

from the moment the vessel had been intercepted until it had arrived at Murmansk; the applicants

had therefore been effectively within Russia’s jurisdiction for the purposes of Article 1 (obligation to

respect human rights).

Secondly, the Court held that it had jurisdiction to examine the admissibility and merits of the

applicants’ case despite the arbitration proceedings and the compensation the applicants had

received.

In particular, the arbitration proceedings had dealt with Russia’s breach of its obligations under the

UNCLOS, while the applicants’ case before the European Court concerned allegations of breaches of

the right to liberty and security and freedom of expression. The applicants had not been a party to

the arbitration proceedings, which were between the Netherlands and Russia, so in fact the

complainants had also been different in each set of proceedings. The Court therefore found that the

arbitration and Strasbourg proceedings, although parallel, had not had the same subject matter and

it was not therefore precluded from dealing with the case (Article 35 § 2 (b)).

Moreover, the Court considered that the applicants could still claim to be victims of a violation of the

Convention (Article 35 § 3 (a)) even though they had received compensation, because there had

never been any acknowledgement of a breach of their rights.

Lastly, although Russia had ceased to be a Party to the European Convention, the Court found that it

still had jurisdiction to deal with the case, as the facts giving rise to the alleged violations of the

Convention had taken place before 16 September 2022 (the date on which Russia ceased to be a

Party to the European Convention).

Article 5

The Court considered that the period from 19 to 24 September 2013, when the Arctic Sunrise had

been under the control of the Russian forces and towed for a nearly a week with all the applicants

on board, had amounted to a deprivation of their liberty. That period had started earlier for the two

applicant activists who had scaled the Prirazlomnaya as they had been taken aboard the Ladoga

against their will on 18 September 2013 and prevented from returning to the Arctic Sunrise until the

following day.

That detention had not, however, been recorded in any form. There had been no plausible

explanation on the part of the Government for that failing. It had moreover been aggravated by the

courts ruling that the start of the applicants’ detention had been on 24 September 2013, meaning

that the period when the Arctic Sunrise was being towed had been discounted as detention.

Unacknowledged detention was a most grave violation of Article 5 and the Court therefore held that

there had been a violation of that provision.

The Court then went on to examine the applicants’ detention after 24 September 2013, which had

been recorded, but it found that it had been arbitrary. It noted in particular that the courts’ and the

investigators’ positions regarding the status of the Prirazlomnaya, with one considering it to be a

vessel and the other a port facility, had been inconsistent and confusing for interpreting the relevant

legislation. Indeed, even though the criminal charges against the applicants had been reclassified as

hooliganism, the applicants had continued to be detained until their release on bail in accordance

with the original order for pre-trial detention, which had been based on piracy charges.

The Court therefore held that that the applicants’ detention after 24 September 2013 and until their

release had not been lawful within the meaning of Article 5 § 1 (c) of the Convention.

Article 10

The applicants’ arrest, detention and criminal prosecution had constituted an interference with their

freedom to express an opinion on a matter of significant social interest, that is the environmental

effects of oil drilling and exploitation.

Given the findings under Article 5 with regard to the arbitrariness and unlawfulness of the

applicants’ detention, it followed that the restriction on their freedom of expression had not been

prescribed by national law either. There had therefore been a violation of Article 10.

Article 41 (just satisfaction)

The Court held, by five votes to two, that the finding of a violation constituted in itself sufficient just

satisfaction for any non-pecuniary damage sustained by the applicants.

Separate opinion

Judge Serghides expressed a partly dissenting opinion, which is annexed to the judgment.

The judgment is available only in English.

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