CEACHIR proti Moldavsku

FIFTH SECTION

CASE OF CEACHIR v. THE REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA

(Application no. 13730/15)

JUDGMENT

STRASBOURG

23 October 2025

This judgment is final but it may be subject to editorial revision.

In the case of Ceachir v. the Republic of Moldova,

The European Court of Human Rights (Fifth Section), sitting as a Committee composed of:

Gilberto Felici, President,
Diana Sârcu,
Sébastien Biancheri, judges,
and Martina Keller, Deputy Section Registrar,

Having regard to:

the application (no. 13730/15) against the Republic of Moldova lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) on 13 March 2015 by a Moldovan national, Ms Tatiana Ceachir (“the applicant”), who was born in 1959, lives in Chișinău and was represented by Mr A. Bivol, a lawyer practising in Chișinău;

the decision to give notice of the complaint concerning alleged breaches of the principles of adversarial proceedings and equality of arms to the Moldovan Government (“the Government”), represented by their Agents, Mr D. Obadă and Ms D. Maimescu, and to declare the remainder of the application inadmissible;

the parties’ observations;

Having deliberated in private on 2 October 2025,

Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date:

SUBJECT MATTER OF THE CASE

1. The application concerns alleged breaches of the principles of adversarial proceedings and equality of arms on account of the reversal of the statutory burden of proof, which allegedly compromised the fairness of proceedings instituted by the applicant, in breach of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention.

2. The applicant owns a house and the plot of land adjacent to it, on which she pays an annual property tax calculated by the State Tax Service (“the STS”) on the basis of the surface area of her property, as measured by the Cadastre Agency usually once every three years. The surface area of the applicant’s property has not changed since the construction of her house. In 2006 the Cadastre Agency determined that the surface area of her immovable property was 447.2 sq. m, which had to be taken as the basis for calculating her tax liability in each of the following three years.

3. On 25 November 2010 the applicant received a notice to pay her property tax which had been issued by the STS on 2 November 2010. The notice also requested payment of several outstanding amounts for the period 2007‑09, noting that the surface area of her registered property had varied from year to year. Being dissatisfied with the information contained in the payment notice in so far as it concerned the surface area of her property and the amounts owed, the applicant asked the STS to annul it, but to no avail.

4. On 14 January 2011 the applicant lodged a court action against the STS, seeking the annulment of the impugned payment notice. She contended that her tax liability had been incorrectly calculated, in that it had been based on the erroneous notion that the surface area of her property had varied during the relevant period. She declared that she had paid her property tax in full for the years in question, and that she could not possibly have incurred any debts or penalties in that regard.

5. By a judgment of 5 June 2012, the Chișinău Court of Appeal allowed the applicant’s action and annulled the 2010 payment notice. Additionally, it ordered the STS to recalculate the property tax owed by the applicant for the period 2007-10 on the basis of accurate measurements of the surface area of her property. The STS lodged an appeal on points of law against that judgment.

6. By a decision of 16 January 2013, the Supreme Court of Justice overturned the lower court’s judgment, noting that the lower court had exceeded the limits of the applicant’s action. The case was remitted for re‑examination to the Buiucani District Court, which had become a court of first instance following an amendment to the Law on Administrative Litigation.

7. In the framework of the fresh examination of the case, on 24 April 2013 the applicant requested that the first-instance court order the respondent authority to submit the documents on which it had based its calculation of her property tax liability. She contended that those documents were crucial for the domestic courts to reach the correct conclusion. However, that issue was left unexamined without any reasons being provided.

8. By a judgment of 3 December 2013, the Buiucani District Court dismissed the action as manifestly ill-founded. It held that the applicant had failed to prove the unlawfulness of the payment notice she was seeking to annul. In a subsequent appeal, the applicant reiterated that she could not substantiate her assertion that her tax liability in the 2010 payment notice had been erroneously calculated without being provided with the documents pertaining to the domestic authorities’ assessment of her property.

9. By a decision of 23 April 2014, the Chișinău Court of Appeal dismissed the applicant’s appeal, relying on the same arguments as the first‑instance court. It added that the STS had based its calculation of her tax liability on the assessment carried out by the Cadastre Agency, which the applicant had failed to challenge.

10. In a subsequent appeal on points of law, the applicant pointed out that the lower courts had disregarded her lawful request to order the STS to submit the documents on which it had relied in issuing the payment notice in question. She also criticised the decisions of the first‑instance court and the appellate court to accept the STS’s assertions without receiving any explanation as to how it had calculated her tax liability, in circumstances where there had been unexplained discrepancies in the payment notice for 2010 and outstanding payments for the previous years.

11. By a final decision of 17 September 2014, the Supreme Court of Justice dismissed the applicant’s appeal on points of law, noting that the appellate court had thoroughly examined the case and interpreted all the facts and questions of law.

THE COURT’S ASSESSMENT

Alleged violation of article 6 § 1 of the Convention

12. The applicant complained under Article 6 § 1 of the Convention that the domestic courts had failed to observe the principles of adversarial proceedings and equality of arms by reversing the statutory burden of proof, thus compromising the fairness of the proceedings.

13. The Court notes that the application is not manifestly ill‑founded within the meaning of Article 35 § 3 (a) of the Convention or inadmissible on any other grounds. It must therefore be declared admissible.

14. The applicant submitted that she had asked the STS to produce documentation substantiating its calculation of her property tax liability, as she had not been satisfied that any amount had been lawfully due. Moreover, the reasons for the different figures given in respect of the surface area of her immovable property had also remained unclear. In the absence of any reply from the STS, the applicant had reiterated her request before the domestic courts, but it had remained unexamined. The applicant argued that the domestic courts had accepted the position of the national authorities as to the lawfulness of the 2010 tax payment notice without any supporting evidence being adduced in that regard. Hence, she had not been able to challenge the correctness of the documents and the corresponding calculations or have their accuracy verified. She claimed that the domestic courts had breached the principle of equality of arms and had failed to observe the principle of adversarial proceedings because they had reversed the burden of proof, contrary to national legal provisions.

15. The Government disagreed, arguing that the applicant had been required to challenge the assessment made by the Cadastre Agency and to prove the unlawful nature of the payment notice issued by the STS. They did not respond to the applicant’s complaint that the statutory burden of proof had been reversed in her court actions against the respondent national authorities.

16. The general principles concerning adversarial proceedings and equality of arms have been summarised in, for example, Janáček v. the Czech Republic (no. 9634/17, § 46, 2 February 2023) and Regner v. the Czech Republic ([GC], no. 35289/11, § 146, 19 September 2017).

17. The Court notes, at the outset, that under Article 24 of the Law on Administrative Litigation (as in force at that time), the burden of proof rested on the defendant when an application for annulment was examined by an administrative court, as in the present case. It notes that the applicant attempted to obtain the relevant documents from the STS before initiating the court proceedings, but she was unsuccessful. Being unaware of the method used by the national authorities to calculate her tax liability, she lodged an action seeking the annulment of the payment notice dated 2 November 2010. She reiterated her request to be provided with evidence which was in the sole possession of the respondent authority.

18. The Court cannot but note that the applicant specifically asked the first‑instance court to order the STS to provide the documents on which it had based its calculation of her property tax liability for the years in question. The material in the case file does not indicate, nor did the Government specify, that the STS produced the documents sought by the applicant. Instead of compelling the respondent authority to submit the requested evidence, the domestic courts – contrary to the principle of adversarial proceedings – did not grant the applicant’s request. Furthermore, neither the STS nor the domestic courts have claimed that the withholding of relevant information was justified by any specific considerations. The Government provided no explanation for the acceptance of such conduct by the domestic courts, which, moreover, obliged the applicant to prove that the calculation of her tax liability had been erroneous.

19. The Court cannot identify any other means by which the applicant could have examined and, if necessary, challenged the calculation of her tax liability. Moreover, in the absence of any of the documents on which the STS based that calculation, the applicant could not make use of her right to have an allegedly erroneous payment notice annulled by an administrative court. In the Court’s view, limiting the information available to the applicant to such an extent required particular care and attention on the part of the domestic courts, to ensure that their decision‑making process was, as far as possible, in compliance with the requirements of adversarial proceedings and equality of arms. Considering that the applicant was obliged to prove the unlawfulness and inaccuracy of the payment notice by referring to documents in the exclusive possession of the national authorities, to which she had no access, the Court finds that the principles of adversarial proceedings and equality of arms were not respected by the domestic courts.

20. Accordingly, there has been a violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention.

APPLICATION OF ARTICLE 41 OF THE CONVENTION

21. The applicant claimed 9,793.44 euros (EUR) in respect of pecuniary damage for the allegedly erroneous amount she had had to pay in property tax. She also claimed EUR 4,000 in respect of non-pecuniary damage and EUR 3,000 in respect of the costs and expenses incurred before the Court.

22. The Government submitted that there was no causal link between the claim in respect of pecuniary damage and the alleged violation. They further argued that the applicant’s claim in respect of non-pecuniary damage was unsubstantiated, and that her claim for costs and expenses was unsubstantiated and excessive.

23. The Court does not discern any causal link between the violation found and the pecuniary damage alleged; it therefore rejects this claim. However, it awards the applicant EUR 2,400 in respect of non‑pecuniary damage, plus any tax that may be chargeable.

24. Having regard to the documents in its possession, the Court considers it reasonable to award EUR 1,000 covering costs and expenses for the proceedings before the Court, plus any tax that may be chargeable to the applicant.

FOR THESE REASONS, THE COURT, UNANIMOUSLY,

1. Declares the application admissible;
2. Holds that there has been a violation of Article 6 § 1 of the Convention;
3. Holds

(a) that the respondent State is to pay the applicant, within three months, the following amounts, to be converted into Moldovan lei at the rate applicable at the date of settlement:

(i) EUR 2,400 (two thousand four hundred euros), plus any tax that may be chargeable, in respect of non-pecuniary damage;

(ii) EUR 1,000 (one thousand euros), plus any tax that may be chargeable to the applicant, in respect of costs and expenses;

(b) that from the expiry of the above-mentioned three months until settlement simple interest shall be payable on the above amounts at a rate equal to the marginal lending rate of the European Central Bank during the default period plus three percentage points;

4. Dismisses the remainder of the applicant’s claim for just satisfaction.

Done in English, and notified in writing on 23 October 2025, pursuant to Rule 77 §§ 2 and 3 of the Rules of Court.

Martina Keller Gilberto Felici
Deputy Registrar President