01 December 2020, 23:57
ECtHR awards Dagestani woman with compensation in case on return of her children
The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) obliged the Russian authorities to pay compensation for moral damage in the amount of 12,500 US dollars to Aminat Makhmudova for failure to comply with a court's decision on transferring custody of children to her. At present, the children stay in Dagestan with the former husband of Aminat Makhmudova.
The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that on May 22, Aminat Makhmudova and her lawyer Oksana Sadchikova were detained in Makhachkala. The former husband of Aminat Makhmudova claimed that women broke into his house.
Aminat Makhmudova, a citizen of Estonia, has been seeking the return of her two children since 2016. The woman's former husband took the children to Dagestan. The court ruled that the children should live with their mother in Estonia. However, the court's decision has not been executed for almost three years already.
After Aminat Makhmudova told her husband about her intention to divorce, he abducted the children from a kindergarten in Estonia, where they lived, and took them to Dagestan. Court marshals four times tried to return the children, but unsuccessfully and without preliminary psychological preparation of the children, the ECtHR stated.
In Northern Caucasus, it is difficult for a divorced woman to obtain custody of her children if a former husband decides to keep them for himself. Relatives can interfere with the communication of the mother with her children and put pressure on the children themselves, human rights defenders note.
The court marshals were not interested in the execution of the court's decision, said lawyer Oksana Sadchikova as quoted by the "Kavkaz.Realii".
This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on December 1, 2020 at 04:48 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.
