The article considers the issue of international legal responsibility for the observance and protection of human rights in the occupied territories of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol, as well as Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Ukraine. Ukraine declares its commitment to protecting the rights of citizens in the occupied territories, while Ukraine has blamed the Russian Federation for human rights violations in these territories. The question arises as to whether this approach is in line with Ukraine’s international legal obligations and the division of responsibilities for the observance of human rights between Ukraine as a sovereign state and the Russian Federation as an occupying power.

The goal of the article is to set a distinction line between the responsibility of the Russian Federation and that of Ukraine for protection of human rights on the occupied territories. It will address the general rules on the obligations of stats concerning human rights protection in case of occupation and analyse the practice of the European Court of Human Rights in order to determine the avenues of application of these rules to situation of occupation of Crimea and parts of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.

It is established that the Russian Federation, as an occupying power, has both negative and positive human rights obligations, while Ukraine has only positive obligations.

There is effective control and jurisdiction of the Russian Federation in the occupied territories, and therefore it is responsible for human rights violations in the occupied territories. Ukraine, for its part, has a chance to avoid such liability if it can demonstrate that it has done everything reasonably possible to meet its positive human rights commitmentsin the occupied territories.

Bibliography

Journal articles

1. Besson S, ‘The Extraterritoriality of the European Convention on Human Rights: Why Human Rights Depend on Jurisdiction and What Jurisdiction Amounts to’ (2012) 25 Leiden Journal of International Law 857–84 (in English).

Websites

 2. ‘Ukraine. Displacement associated with Conflict and Violence. Figure Analysis – GRID 2020’ (Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre) <https://www.internaldisplacement. org/sites/default/files/2020-04/GRID%202020%20%E2% 80%93%20Conflict%20Figure%20Analysis%20%E2%80%93%20UKRAINE.pdf> (accessed: 23.09.2020) (in Eng lish).