Children of the Gulag, Long Road to Justice: The Challenges and Limitations of Reparations in Russia

Abstract

ABSTRACT∞ The article examines the 2019 judgment of the Constitutional Court of Russia concerning the right to compensation of housing and right to return of the children of the victims deported by the Soviet state to the gulag or exile. Despite the favourable judgment of the Constitutional Court, the right to remedy for the victims was still unattainable. The article examines why this was the case by drawing on the absence of internal and external coherence of reparations programmes, the approach to reparations throughout history in the Soviet Union and Russia, the Law on Rehabilitation and other factors that rendered the reparations unobtainable. The article argues that in the absence of holistic transitional justice measures and accountability for crimes, separate laws and court judgments have been unable to deliver justice, resulting in a long, cumbersome and often humiliating and fruitless process for victims attempting to claim their rights.