ERGI JUDGMENT OF 28 JULY 1998 32 guaranteed under Article 25 § 1 (see paragraph 26 above). The respondent State had therefore failed to comply with its obligations under this provision. 104. The Government strongly contested the Commission’s conclusion. In the first place, they maintained that the allegations of pressure had arisen for the first time after statements had been taken on 30 October and 3 November 1995 (see paragraph 26 above), which was approximately a year and a half after the introduction of the application and seven months after the Commission’s decision on admissibility (see paragraphs 1 and 55 above). Furthermore, the Government emphasised that the Turkish authorities had to interview the applicant on his request for legal aid before the Commission. Thus, its Secretary had in fact invited the Government to comment on the request. The object of the interview was to verify his declaration of means. At no point was the applicant subjected to any direct or indirect pressure to force him to abandon his application or to deprive him of his status in the proceedings before the Commission. There was a contradiction in the Commission’s stance in that it had first asked the Government to cooperate and then sanctioned them after they had reported their findings and conclusions. 105. The Court observes from the outset that the timing of the applicant’s complaint under Article 25 does not give rise to any issue of admissibility under the Convention. The Government’s arguments on this point must be rejected. As to the merits of the complaint, it is to be noted that, as appears from the records of the statements (see paragraph 26 above), these were not confined to matters regarding the applicant’s declaration of means. He was asked about the subject matter of his application to the Commission and to provide an explanation concerning any application he might have made. Also, the Court sees no plausible reason as to why the applicant was heard twice by the authorities and why the questioning had been conducted by the anti-terrorism department of the police and the public prosecutor. In view of this, the Court, like the Commission, considers that the applicant must have felt intimidated as a result of his contact with the authorities on these occasions in a manner which unduly interfered with his petition to the Commission. In this connection, the Court recalls that it is of the utmost importance for the effective operation of the system of individual petition instituted by Article 25 of the Convention that an applicant be able to communicate freely with the Commission, without any form of pressure from the authorities to withdraw or modify his or her complaints, (see the Akdivar and Others v. Turkey judgment of 16 September 1996, Reports 1996-IV, p. 1219, § 105; and the above-mentioned Aksoy judgment, p. 2288, § 105). The facts of the present case disclose that the respondent