Ukrainian Family Awarded 1.8 million US Dollars in Damages
A Kyiv court ordered the amount be recovered from the Russian Federation.
A Ukrainian family has been awarded more than 68 million hryvnias (1.8 million US dollars) for property and moral damage caused to them by the full-scale invasion of Russia into Ukraine.
On June 1, the Kyiv-Sviatoshyn district court of the Kyiv region partially satisfied the family’s claim against the Russian Federation, following their December 2022 civil lawsuit.
The plaintiffs, namely a father, mother and their child on whose behalf the legal representatives filed the application, are from the village of Dmytrivka in the Bucha district of Kyiv region.
In March 2022, the Russian military occupied the village and the family’s house was destroyed by fire. Russian soldiers shot the plaintiffs' dog and many of the family’s pets were burnt alive.
The family was forced to flee, driving for 14 hours with their young child in search of shelter. After their forced relocation, the family were temporarily separated and had to change their place of residence several times.
According to the plaintiffs' position, all these events caused them significant moral and property damage. Therefore they asked the court to recover just over 68 million hryvnias (1.8m dollars) in property and moral damages from the state of the Russian Federation in favour of the family.
The Kyiv-Sviatoshyn district court of the Kyiv region opened the proceedings on this case on January 16, 2023, and closed the preparatory session on April 19, 2023. The court then assigned the case to be considered in open session.
The defendant - a representative of the Russian Federation - did not appear at the court session. The court considered that the defendant had been properly informed about the proceedings, because its decision had been posted to the Russian Embassy in Poland, with a copy of the statement of claim and the subpoenas for a summons to court together with notarised translations into Russian.
The court also sent copies of these documents to the official e-mail addresses of the prosecutor general's office of the Russian Federation and the ministries of foreign affairs and justice.
The defendant was summoned to each hearing by announcements on the court's publicly accessible website, which is considered proper notice of the proceedings.
The court was unable to inform the representative of Russia about the case through diplomatic channels because bilateral relations have been severed and there is no postal service between Ukraine and the Russian Federation.
The plaintiffs also independently informed the Russian Federation about the consideration of the case, emailing a copy of the claim with notarised translations into Russian to the official e-mail addresses of the Russian prosecutor general and ministries of foreign affairs and justice.
In the materials of the court register, it was noted that in a letter dated May 26, the ministry of foreign affairs of the defendant informed the family of the plaintiffs about forwarding their notification about the consideration of this case under the sub-department to the prosecutor general’s office of the Russian Federation.
After examining the case materials, the court came to the conclusion that the claims were subject to partial satisfaction. According to the law, the Russian Federation as the occupying power is responsible for the violation of the protection of the rights of the civilian population. Compensation for material and moral damage caused as a result of temporary occupation rests in full on the Russian Federation as the occupying state.
The court found that the father of the family began to build a house in the village of Dmytrivka in 2015 to which they moved in 2019. The family had many pets, including two parrots, a mouflon sheep, two Alabai dogs, two cats, four roe deer and several rabbits.
On March 30, 2022, the house was completely destroyed in a fire caused by artillery and shrapnel. This was confirmed by the Fire Act provided to the court, drawn up on October 17, 2022 by representatives of the Ukrainian State Emergency Service.
The plaintiff also submitted to the court expert conclusions that the destruction of the house occurred as a result of a fire, the cause of which was the ignition of the wooden structural elements of the building by the thermal effect of the explosion of ammunition. In court, two neighbours appeared as witnesses and described the destruction of the house and provision of medical aid to one injured roe deer which managed to survive.
According to the experts' conclusion, on February 15, 2022 - that is, before the start of a full-scale war - the value of the destroyed house, excluding the value of the land, was 65 million 475,632 hryvnias and 38 kopecks.
The court decided that the plaintiffs had proven the fact that they had suffered material losses. The judge partially satisfied the lawsuit, because the family asked to collect property damage of 208,000 hryvnias more than the value of the destroyed house.
The court decided to collect from the Russian Federation exactly the amount of the house's value as property damage.
As regarding moral damages, the plaintiffs said they continued to suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, weakness and fatigue.
When deciding on the satisfaction of the claims, the court took into account that the Russian Federation, having carried out armed aggression against Ukraine, violated a number of international legal norms, in particular the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Budapest Memorandum. The Russian Federation went beyond its sovereign rights guaranteed by the UN Charter and is therefore an aggressor state, which in turn indicates its lack of judicial immunity.
A state that grossly violates basic freedoms and human rights guaranteed by international law cannot use immunity from prosecution by foreign courts as a guarantee of avoiding responsibility for crimes committed against human life and health, as well as damage to property.
Therefore, the court also decided to collect three million hryvnias in moral damages - one million each, as requested by the plaintiffs.
This court decision can be appealed within 30 days.
Meanwhile, the Kyiv-Sviatoshyn district court of the Kyiv region opened proceedings in another case regarding a claim against the Russian Federation, represented by the ministry of justice, for compensation for material and moral damage caused by the state’s armed aggression against Ukraine. The preliminary proceedings are scheduled for July 6.
