ECHR will consider the case on websites banning in Russia as "potentially leading". It is noted that it will as well determine the practice in this sphere in other countries. This is reported by Vedomosti with reference to Damir Gainutdinov, legal analyst of the international human rights group Mezhdunarodnaya Agora, who represents in Strasbourg the interests of the plaintiff, director of the Association of Internet Publishers, Vladimir Kharitonov.
The complaint of Vladimir Kharitonov, the head of the Association of Internet Publishers, was registered by the ECHR in May this year (see "ECHR asks Russian authorities to explain the law on banning websites"). He filed to the Constitutional Court after he failed to appeal the banning of his website due to the use of one IP-address with another web page. Since the law came into force in 2012, along with sites included in the register at least 5 million websites have been blocked, another 3 million are under the threat of mass banning.
In September, the president of the ECHR section noted that the Kharitonov’s case was "potentially leading", for it was systemic in nature and could require appropriate measures. As a third party, the Russian organization Roskomsvoboda, international human rights organizations protecting the rights of the media – Access Now, Articl¢ 19, the Electronic Frontiers Fund and the European Institute of the Information Society (Slovakia) were involved in the case.
Source: Право.ru