The Ministry of Justice has taken note of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) ruling on the case of Alexandr Stoianoglo, issued on Tuesday, October 24, and has come up with first clarifications, set out in an information note.

On the applicant’s complaint that he did not have access to a court of law to challenge his suspension from office under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, the Ministry of Justice stressed that the ECtHR had upheld the Government’s argument on this point.

“With regard to the applicability of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention, the Court upheld the Government’s argument that national legislation excluded, at that time, the possibility of challenging the suspension from office. The Court held that the automatic suspension from office of the Prosecutor General, in the event of criminal proceedings being brought against him, could not be justified by objective reasons determined by the interests of the State, in the absence of any form of judicial review,” the information note said.

The Ministry of Justice also recalled that the judgment becomes final three months after its publication. Subsequently, in the enforcement procedure, individual measures are to be implemented by paying compensation for the non-material damage caused to the plaintiff.

“We would like to point out that recently amendments have been made to the Law on the Prosecutor’s Office, in which the mechanism for suspending the Prosecutor General from office has been revised, in order to avoid such decisions in the future,” the Ministry of Justice notes.

Moldova will have to pay the former Prosecutor General Alexandr Stoianoglo €3,600 – moral damages. The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) handed down its decision on Tuesday 24 October.

The ECtHR unanimously found a violation of Article 6 § 1 (right of access to a court) of the European Convention on Human Rights. The case concerned the Prosecutor General’s inability to appeal against his suspension, which was triggered by the criminal proceedings that had been initiated against him.