56
CATAN AND OTHERS v. MOLDOVA AND RUSSIA JUDGMENT
164. The Russian Government submitted that the applicants’ claims
were unfounded and unsubstantiated. The Court should be guided by its
own case-law rather than the approach of the Inter-American Court. The
events complained of took place for the most part in 2002 and 2004 and
were subsequently resolved. In any event, the applicants had not provided
any documentary evidence to substantiate the claims that certain among
them lost their jobs, were arrested and interrogated, suffered physical
violence and received warnings and threats. The Hopkins Symptom
Checklist-25, which measures symptoms of anxiety and depression, was
designed to be administered by health care workers under the supervision of
a psychiatrist or medical doctor. When self-administered, as by the
applicants, it was unreliable and proved little. Finally, in the view of the
Government of the Russian Federation, the present case was not comparable
to Sampanis, cited above, which concerned discrimination suffered by
Greek citizens living in Greece. The Russian Federation had consistently
expressed the view that applicants living in Transdniestria did not fall
within Russian jurisdiction. In the event that the Court were to reach a
contrary conclusion, the finding of violation would be adequate just
satisfaction.
165. The Court recalls that it has not found it necessary or indeed
possible in the present case to examine separately each applicant’s claims
regarding acts of harassment directed at him or her by the “MRT”
authorities. Moreover, the applicants’ claims under Article 3 of the
Convention were declared inadmissible by the Chamber on 15 June 2010.
The Chamber observed that the applicants did not “provide any objective
medical evidence”. It held that “the self-administered [Hopkins Symptom
Checklist-25] tests are no substitute for an examination and assessment by a
mental health professional” and concluded that the evidence before it did
not support the view that the high threshold of Article 3 had been reached
(Catan and Others v. Moldova and Russia (dec.), nos. 43370/04, 8252/05
and 18454/06, § 108, 15 June 2010).
166. It is clear, however, that the applicants, both parents and children,
have sustained non-pecuniary damage as a consequence of the “MRT”‘s
language policy, for which the finding of a violation of the Convention does
not afford sufficient redress. However, the amounts claimed by the
applicants are excessive. Ruling on an equitable basis, the Court assesses
the non-pecuniary damage sustained by each of the applicants at
EUR 6,000.
B. Costs and expenses
167. The applicants did not submit a separate claim for the costs and
expenses of the Grand Chamber proceedings. However, on 20 September
2010 they submitted a claim for the costs and expenses of the proceedings