Supreme Court resolutions are not considered laws though, such documents are second in importance, with local judges analyzing their provisions (after criminal, civil or other specialized codes) prior to specific verdicts.
Specific damages being awarded by courts (as compensation for plaintiffs' moral damage and business-reputation damage) should be commensurate to the damage incurred. Such compensations should not infringe upon press freedom or entail any specific publication's bankruptcy, the document notes.
Interest toward such cases became more pronounced, after the Moscow court of arbitration upheld an Alfa Bank lawsuit against the Commersant publishing house. The court ordered the paper to pay $11 million to Alfa-Bank. Russian legislation did not set any financial limits on the plaintiff's moral sufferings until now. Consequently, Russian courts could have turned into an instrument for exerting financial pressure on any undesirable media bodies. The Russian Supreme Court has decided to put an end to this.
Mikhail Barshchevsky, who serves as the Russian government's representative in the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court and the Higher Court of Arbitration, believes that the resolution is unlikely to affect court of arbitration rulings because such courts do not depend on general jurisdiction courts. "Specific damages should be commensurate to the damage itself," Mr. Barshchevsky said. "Such compensations must depend on the extent of damage, rather than on the solvency of any specific newspaper. Otherwise, all the poorest newspapers enjoy greater immunity."
