ANATOLIY MARINOV v. BULGARIA JUDGMENT appeared that the applicable law required that a person under partial guardianship may instruct a lawyer provided that the form of authority was signed by the guardian, but for the procedure before the Court such an authority was not required, see also Zehentner v. Austria, no. 20082/02, § 39, 16 July 2009). Therefore, the Court dismisses the first preliminary objection by the Government. (b) Regarding the exhaustion of domestic remedies 25. The general principles on the rule of exhaustion of domestic remedies have been summarised in Vučković and Others v. Serbia ((preliminary objection) [GC], nos. 17153/11 and 29 others, §§ 69-77, 25 March 2014). That rule obliges those seeking to bring a case against the State before an international judicial body to use first the remedies provided by the national legal system, thus dispensing States from answering before an international body for their acts before they have had an opportunity to put matters right through their own legal systems. In order to comply with the rule, normal recourse should be had by an applicant to remedies which are available and sufficient to afford redress in respect of the breaches alleged (ibid., §§ 70 and 71, with further references). 26. The only remedies to be exhausted are those which are effective. It is incumbent on the Government claiming non-exhaustion to satisfy the Court that the remedy was an effective one, available in theory and in practice at the relevant time, that is to say, that it was accessible, was one which was capable of providing redress in respect of the applicant’s complaints and offered reasonable prospects of success. Once this burden of proof has been satisfied, it falls to the applicant to establish that the remedy advanced by the Government was in fact exhausted, or was for some reason inadequate and ineffective in the particular circumstances of the case, or that special circumstances existed which absolved him or her from this requirement (ibid., § 77; see also Kalashnikov v. Russia (dec.), no. 47095/99, ECHR 2001-XI (extracts), with further references). 27. In the instant case, the Court notes the Government’s observation that had the applicant himself conducted the proceedings for the judicial termination of his guardianship he could have secured the restoration of his right to vote (paragraph 20 above). However, the Court observes that the courts that examined the applicant’s civil action for the restoration of his civil capacity – namely the Ruse Regional Court and the Veliko Tarnovo Court of Appeal – terminated those proceedings, having deemed that the applicant should have been acting as the respondent (and not as a claimant) in those civil proceedings; in so doing, those courts denied him direct access to a court in respect of that matter (paragraphs 7-9 above). The Court reiterates, in that respect, that it has already ruled that such a situation was in breach of the rights protected under Article 6, and has even indicated to the Bulgarian authorities that they should provide for the necessary general measures to 6