ROMAN ZAKHAROV v. RUSSIA JUDGMENT
51
following an individual complaint. Given the secrecy of interception
measures and the lack of any notification of the person concerned, such
individual complaints were unlikely to be lodged, with the result that
counter-intelligence-related surveillance measures de facto escaped any
supervision by prosecutors. It was also significant that prosecutors had no
power to cancel an interception authorisation, to discontinue unlawful
interceptions or to order the destruction of unlawfully obtained data.
207. Further, prosecutors’ biannual reports were not published or
publicly discussed. The reports were classified documents and contained
statistical information only. They did not contain any substantive analysis of
the state of legality in the sphere of operational-search activities or any
information about what breaches of law had been detected and what
measures had been taken to remedy them. Moreover, the reports
amalgamated together all types of operational-search activities, without
separating interceptions from other measures.
(β) The Government
208. The Government submitted that supervision of operational-search
activities, including interceptions of telephone communications, was
exercised by the President, Parliament and the government. In particular, the
President determined the national security strategy and appointed and
dismissed the heads of all law-enforcement agencies. There was also a
special department within the President’s Administration which supervised
the activities of the law-enforcement agencies, including operational-search
activities. That department consisted of officials from the Ministry of the
Interior and the FSB who had the appropriate level of security clearance.
Parliament participated in the supervision process by adopting and
amending laws governing operational-search activities. It could also form
committees and commissions and hold parliamentary hearings on all issues,
including those relating to operational-search activities, and could hear the
heads of law-enforcement agencies if necessary. The government adopted
decrees and orders governing operational-search activities and allocated the
budgetary funds to the law-enforcement agencies.
209. Supervision was also exercised by the Prosecutor General and
competent low-level prosecutors who were independent from the federal,
regional and local authorities. The Prosecutor General and his deputies were
appointed and dismissed by the Federation Council, the upper house of
Parliament. Prosecutors were not entitled to lodge interception requests.
Such requests could be lodged either by the State agency performing
operational-search activities in the framework of the OSAA, or by the
investigator in the framework of the CCrP. The prosecutor could not give
any instructions to the investigator. In the course of a prosecutor’s
inspection, the head of the intercepting agency had an obligation to submit
all relevant materials to the prosecutor at his request and could be held