By RIA Novosti,
Riga : The European Court of Human Rights upheld on Monday Latvia’s appeal against a June ruling that Riga must pay World War II veteran Vasily Kononov 30,000 euros ($47,000) in damages, local media said.
The Latvian government filed an appeal to the court’s Grand Chamber after a June 19, 2008, ruling ordered Latvia to pay Kononov compensation for being held in custody on charges of war crimes.
The 86-year-old veteran, who had originally demanded 5 million euros ($7.8 million) in compensation, at the time called the decision “a mockery.” In 2007, the European court dismissed all charges against Kononov and ruled him not guilty.
The compensation ruling is now to be reviewed in the Strasburg court’s Grand Chamber, the tvnet.lv website said.
Kononov, who led a group of resistance fighters against Nazi Germany in the Baltic state during WWII, was convicted by Latvian authorities of ordering the killing of nine villagers in 1944, with some reports saying the dead included a pregnant woman.
He admitted to the killings, but said the dead were Nazi collaborators, and were caught in the crossfire. Latvia was under German occupation at the time of the incident.
A retired police colonel born in Latvia, Kononov was arrested in 1998 and sentenced to six years in prison in 2000 on genocide charges. In 2004, after several years of litigation, his sentence was cut to 20 months and the charges changed to “war crimes.” Kononov filed an appeal with the Strasbourg court the same year.
The court rejected Kononov’s other demands, which included moral damages and compensation for the apartment and plot of land he had been forced to sell in order to pay for court expenses and medical treatment.
Russia subsequently applied pressure on Latvian and European authorities over the case and in April 2004 Kononov was granted Russian citizenship by then-President Vladimir Putin.