Inadmissibility decision; Subjects: SWITZERLAND, TORTURE AND OTHER CRUEL TREATMENT; [CAT: UNO-Antifolterkonvention, Übereinkommen gegen Folter; Convention contre la torture; Convenzione contro la tortura]
Volltext (verifizierbarer Originaltext)
GE.26-06273 (E) 020626 020626
Committee against Torture
Decision adopted by the Committee under article 22 of the
Convention, concerning communication No. 1149/2022*, **
Communication submitted by:
A (represented by counsel, Marine Zurbuchen)
Alleged victim:
The complainant
State Party:
Switzerland
Date of complaint:
16 August 2022 (initial submission)
Document references:
Decision taken pursuant to rules 114 and 115 of
the Committee’s rules of procedure, transmitted
to the State Party on 17 August 2022 (not issued
in document form)
Date of adoption of decision:
17 April 2026
Subject matter:
Deportation to Sri Lanka
Procedural issues:
Exhaustion of domestic remedies; lack of
substantiation of claims
Substantive issues:
Risk of torture or other cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment or punishment if deported to
country of origin (non-refoulement)
Articles of the Convention:
3, 14 and 16
1.1
The complainant is A, a national of Sri Lanka born in 1996. She applied for asylum
in Switzerland, but her application was rejected. She is facing removal to Sri Lanka and
claims that her removal would constitute a violation by the State Party of articles 3, 14 and
16 of the Convention. The State Party made the declaration under article 22 (1) of the
Convention on 2 December 1986. The complainant is represented by counsel.
1.2
On 17 August 2022, pursuant to rule 114 of its rules of procedure, the Committee,
acting through its Rapporteur on new complaints and interim measures, requested the State
Party not to deport the complainant to Sri Lanka while the communication was being
considered.
* Adopted by the Committee at its eighty-fourth session (13 April–1 May 2026).
** The following members of the Committee participated in the examination of the communication:
Jorge Contesse, Lorena Gonzáles Pinto, Claude Heller, Erdogan Iscan, Peter Vedel Kessing,
Liu Huawen, Maeda Naoko, Moulaye Abdallah Moulaye Abdallah, Ana Racu and
Abderrazak Rouwane.
United Nations
CAT/C/84/D/1149/2022
Convention against Torture
and Other Cruel, Inhuman
or Degrading Treatment
or Punishment
Distr.: General
12 May 2026
English
Original: French
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1.3
On 19 August 2022, the State Party informed the Committee that, in accordance with
its established procedure, the State Secretariat for Migration had requested the competent
authority to refrain from taking any steps to remove the complainant, who was therefore
assured of remaining in Switzerland pending the consideration of her complaint by the
Committee.
Facts as submitted by the complainant
2.1
The complainant is of Tamil ethnicity. In 1995, her maternal uncle was abducted by
unknown individuals in a white van. He was suspected of being associated with the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.1 The complainant’s aunt has made efforts to locate him,
including contacting the Red Cross, but has still not heard from him to date. The
complainant’s father was forcibly recruited to fight for the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.2
In 2009, he disappeared. The complainant learned from a friend that he had fled to India
because he was wanted in Sri Lanka as a result of problems with the army.3 Since then, she
has not heard from him. Also in 2009, the army carried out airstrikes that destroyed residents’
homes, including the complainant’s. The complainant sustained an injury to her foot caused
by shrapnel, and her mother was raped during the war.
2.2
Between 2009 and 2010, the complainant moved to another village. In 2013, she took
part in a demonstration organized by a member of Parliament in Jaffna calling for the release
of Tamils who had been arrested and were being held captive by the army. The police struck
the protesters in an attempt to break up the demonstration and arrested the complainant. The
police threatened her with death, kidnapping or reprisals against her family. She was held in
custody for three days, during which time she was locked up and restrained in a room with
no light. She was beaten repeatedly and deprived of food. While she was in custody, police
officers threw cold water on her and violently pulled her by the hair, causing her to lose
consciousness. Her mother managed to get her released from custody. 4 Following this
traumatic episode, the complainant began to suffer from mild to moderate depression, without
psychotic features. She started receiving psychological treatment in Kilinochchi in 2015. In
2016, she attempted suicide, which can be attributed to the stress caused by the persecution
she had endured.
2.3
In March 2017, the complainant collected data from Tamil families, in collaboration
with the Tamil National Alliance, and participated in an anti-Government demonstration to
reclaim land belonging to the Tamils that had been confiscated by the Sinhalese military.
During the demonstration, police threw stones at participants and sprayed them with water.
The complainant was arrested by the police and held in custody for two days without food or
water. The police confiscated her phone and threatened her with a knife. In addition to death
threats, she was also subjected to physical violence in the form of blows to the head. Her
mother came to beg the police to let her go. When the complainant was released, the police
officers tried to intimidate her by ordering her to stop participating in demonstrations. About
a month after her arrest, police officers came to her home and warned her not to take part in
such protests again, threatening her and her family with reprisals.5
2.4
In January 2018, masked men armed with knives showed up at the complainant’s
home and waited for her outside. They showed a photo of the complainant to her family
members, who told them she had gone out. They searched her home for an hour, broke things
and hit her mother. These men were travelling in a white van, identical to the one belonging
to the people who had kidnapped her uncle in 1995. In addition, the complainant learned that,
in late 2017 and early 2018, people who had participated in the same demonstrations as she
had had been kidnapped, including one of her comrades. She was scared, so she fled the
family home; she then hid out at her aunt’s house for two or three months. Fearing that she
might be kidnapped and/or killed, and not wanting to cause trouble for her maternal aunt, the
1 No further details provided.
2 No further details provided.
3 No further details provided.
4 No further details provided.
5 No further details provided.
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complainant was forced to leave the country on 26 or 27 March 2018. She first stayed in
Uganda for eight months, then travelled to Switzerland, where she filed an asylum application
on 7 December 2018.6
2.5
Since the complainant’s arrival in Switzerland, her mother – with whom she has
remained in contact – has told her that the police came to their family home in connection
with her involvement in political activities. Since the complainant had fled the country, the
police targeted her mother and visited her home several times.7 The complainant’s mother
eventually fled to Canada to join the complainant’s sister there. The State Secretariat for
Migration interviewed the complainant on 11 December 2018 and 31 July 2019.
2.6
On 16 April 2020, the State Secretariat for Migration rejected the complainant’s
asylum application. It noted that her statements contained contradictions regarding key
aspects of her grounds for asylum, particularly with regard to the dates, durations and
locations of the two arrests to which she claimed to have been subjected. Furthermore, during
her first hearing, the complainant stated that police officers had come to her home one month
after she participated in the 2017 demonstration, that she was home at the time and that they
had told her not to participate in such demonstrations again; however, during her second
hearing, the complainant failed to mention this police visit, stating instead that unknown
individuals, masked and armed with knives, had come to her home while she was out. When
asked to explain this significant inconsistency, the complainant was unable to provide a
convincing answer to the State Secretariat, stating simply that she had forgotten about the
police visit.
2.7
The State Secretariat noted that the complainant’s statements regarding the
circumstances of her departure from the country were inconsistent. In her initial account, she
claimed to have travelled using a borrowed passport that her smuggler had obtained for her;
later, in another account, she claimed to have travelled using a passport that she had applied
for herself in Colombo in June 2017. When asked to comment on these contradictions, she
was unable to provide convincing explanations. The State Secretariat then noted that –
according to established jurisprudence – it is not sufficient for a person to have learned from
a third party that they are wanted in order to establish a well-founded fear of future
persecution. Consequently, the complainant’s claims that her mother had informed her that
the police were looking for her and had gone to the family home after she left the country
were not deemed sufficient.
2.8
The State Secretariat also examined whether there were any risk factors that would
preclude the complainant’s deportation. In this regard, it noted that she had never had any
direct contact with or ties to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and had never worked on
their behalf, that her involvement with the Tamil National Alliance was not such as to make
her a known opponent of the Government and that she had not stated that she had participated
in activities of the Tamil community in Switzerland. Consequently, the State Secretariat
concluded that the circumstances surrounding the complainant’s departure were not credible
and that she had not substantiated her claim that she was being targeted by the Sri Lankan
authorities prior to her departure.
2.9
On 28 April 2022, the Federal Administrative Court rejected the complainant’s appeal
as manifestly unfounded. It found that, regardless of the plausibility of the complainant’s
claims that she had been detained and that the police had warned her not to participate in
demonstrations, the facts cited were not sufficiently serious to conclude that there was a risk
of persecution. Furthermore, the Court ruled out the possibility that the complainant was
being sought – first in January 2018 and then on five or six further occasions after she left
Sri Lanka – by unknown, masked and armed individuals travelling in a white van; it was of
the view that the complainant would not have failed to mention, during her initial hearing,
that she had fled her country to escape these people who allegedly wanted to kill her, even
though this was allegedly clearly the trigger for her departure from Sri Lanka. In the absence
of a convincing explanation on this point, the omission cannot be attributed to stress. The
Court noted the complainant’s contradictory statements regarding the passport she had with
6 No further details provided.
7 No further details provided.
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her when she left Sri Lanka (she initially claimed it was a forged passport but later stated that
it was her own genuine passport). The Court also noted that she had been unable to name the
African country where she claimed to have stayed from March to December 2018, nor the
city in Italy where she claimed to have subsequently landed.
2.10
With regard to the complainant’s profile, the Federal Administrative Court noted that
her file contained no evidence that would lead the Sri Lankan authorities to suspect her of
having ties to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and that risk factors such as her ethnicity,
the fact that she is originally from the Northern Province, her stay in Switzerland or returning
to Sri Lanka on a laissez-passer were risk factors so minor that they were not sufficient in
themselves to justify an objective fear of serious harm. Consequently, there was no risk that
the complainant would be subjected to treatment prohibited by the Convention if she were
returned. Similarly, according to a medical report dated 19 May 2020,8 her mental health
condition was not serious enough to constitute an obstacle to the enforcement of the removal
order, especially since continuing treatment in Sri Lanka was deemed possible, given that the
complainant had been treated there since 2015, that is, before leaving the country.
2.11
A medical report dated 23 June 2022 confirms that the complainant suffers from
post-traumatic stress disorder and is taking medication. According to the doctor, the
complainant would be at high risk of suicide if deported.9 Furthermore, the psychiatric care
she received in Sri Lanka did not lead to any significant stabilization of her mental condition.
At present, Sri Lanka is in the midst of a severe economic crisis and it is therefore highly
unlikely that she will be able to receive psychiatric care.
Complaint
3.1
The complainant claims that her deportation to Sri Lanka would constitute a violation
of her rights under articles 3, 14 and 16 of the Convention. In addition to the existence of a
pattern of serious, flagrant and widespread human rights violations in Sri Lanka, the
complainant cites several grounds to explain why there is a personal, foreseeable and real
risk that she would be subjected to torture if returned to Sri Lanka: her Tamil ethnicity, the
fact that she is from the Northern Province, the fact that her father is a member of the
Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and that her uncle is suspected of being a member, her own
participation in anti-Government activities, the arbitrary arrests and acts of torture she
suffered at the hands of the Sri Lankan authorities, her flight from the country at a time when
she was under strong suspicion, the asylum application she filed in Switzerland and her long
stay abroad.
3.2
The complainant asserts that the Swiss authorities did not properly assess the risk of
torture within the meaning of article 3 of the Convention. They merely stated that the case
file contained no evidence that would support a conclusion that there was a real risk, based
on substantial grounds, that the applicant might be subjected to torture or inhuman or
degrading treatment. This statement seems incomplete and particularly superficial. Under
these circumstances, it should be noted that the authorities did not properly assess the risk of
torture to which the complainant would be exposed if returned. Furthermore, she was not
represented by legal counsel or a professionally qualified representative during her appeal
proceedings.
3.3
The complainant claims that the State Party has also violated articles 14 and 16 of the
Convention by failing to respect her right to rehabilitation as a victim of torture. Given her
medical condition, particularly her post-traumatic stress disorder, the risk of suicide she
would face if returned and the need for a stable and safe environment, the State Party also
violated article 3 of the Convention by ordering her return to the country where she was
tortured and where she risks being tortured again. The complainant therefore requires
continued specialized and tailored care in Switzerland. Since the complainant is a victim of
torture, it is essential that she receive appropriate care in order to ensure her right to
rehabilitation under article 14 of the Convention.
8 Moderate depressive episode requiring regular psychiatric care and medication since February 2019.
9 The complainant attempted suicide in 2016.
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3.4
Although the complainant received psychiatric treatment in Sri Lanka from 2015 to
2018, it was insufficient. The Federal Administrative Court disregarded the fact that this
treatment was insufficient and failed to consider the extent to which the complainant could
realistically receive care again, given the current economic crisis in Sri Lanka and the
extreme poverty she would face if returned.
State Party’s observations on admissibility and the merits
4.1
On 13 February 2023, the State Party submitted its observations. First, it notes that
the complainant provided the Committee with a medical report dated 23 June 2022, which
had not been submitted to the asylum authorities. The State Party thus considers that she has
not exhausted all domestic remedies, given that she had the option to apply for a
re-examination of her asylum application based on new evidence.
4.2
With regard to the merits, the State Party reiterates the arguments presented by the
Swiss asylum authorities. It acknowledges that the human rights situation in Sri Lanka is
worrying in many respects10 but points out that this situation and the risk of being subjected
to torture in the event of return were already thoroughly assessed by the Federal
Administrative Court in a reference judgment.11 According to this judgment, not all returnees
with a real or supposed present or past link to the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam
necessarily risk persecution. Only persons accused of rekindling ethnic conflict face such a
risk. The same applies to Sri Lankan nationals who have engaged in political activities in
exile. In the present case, the complainant has failed to plausibly argue that she has attracted
the attention of the Sri Lankan authorities.
4.3
With regard to the complainant’s medical condition, the State Party notes that she
relies primarily on a medical report dated 23 June 2022, which was issued two months after
the Federal Administrative Court’s ruling of 28 April 2022. This medical report notes that
she suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, the origins of which date back to her
childhood against the backdrop of the civil war and not to the alleged mistreatment she
experienced in 2013 and 2017 – as evidenced by the fact that she had been seeing a
psychiatrist in her home country since 2015. The State Party asserts that, according to
information requested in late July 2022, psychiatric clinics and outpatient facilities at various
hospitals in Sri Lanka are open. In the Northern Province in particular, the Jaffna Teaching
Hospital has a psychiatry department staffed by two psychiatrists and clinical psychologists.
These psychiatrists also occasionally work at local hospitals in Chavakachcheri and Point
Pedro. Therapists and nurses also work in this department. In addition, persons experiencing
mental health problems can contact specialists through a helpline or via the National Institute
of Mental Health or can consult them directly at the psychiatry departments of district
hospitals and university clinics.
4.4
With regard to the issue of the supply of medicines, the Swiss authorities, which are
closely monitoring the situation in Sri Lanka, are aware of the shortages and rationing.
Nevertheless, it should be noted that many psychotropic medicines are available in the
country and can also be ordered from online pharmacies. In addition, in response to this
situation, healthcare professionals are adopting strategies such as prescribing alternative
medications that are always available in the country or dispensing only a portion of the
prescribed amount while waiting for new supplies to arrive. The Shanthiham association also
provides support and counselling to people with depression, particularly women, and works
to prevent self-harm.12 The State Party concludes that the complainant can receive the care
and treatment she needs in Jaffna.
Complainant’s comments on the State Party’s observations
5.1
On 23 October 2023, the complainant submitted her comments. With regard to the
State Party’s allegation that domestic remedies have not been exhausted, she asserts that the
medical report dated 23 June 2022 is merely additional evidence supporting the substance of
10 See CAT/C/LKA/CO/5.
11 Federal Administrative Court, judgment E-1866/2015, 15 July 2016.
12 https://www.peaceinsight.org/en/organisations/shanthiham/?location=sri-lanka&theme.
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the complaint submitted to the Committee. The report does not indicate a significant
deterioration in her mental health, but merely clarifies the diagnosis and trauma experienced
by the complainant. That medical report would therefore not have been sufficient to support
a request for re-examination. Furthermore, a request for re-examination does not constitute
an effective remedy, as it does not automatically have suspensive effect.
5.2
On the merits, the complainant challenges the asylum authorities’ assessment of the
facts and evidence. She considers that, since the State Party has not undertaken any further
investigative measures, it has not properly assessed the risk of torture to which she would be
exposed in the event of a return and has failed to fulfil its obligation to conduct an effective,
independent and impartial examination. At the very least, the Swiss authorities should have
investigated the issue of torture during her detention more thoroughly and not merely
dismissed the severity of the acts experienced by the complainant. She cannot be blamed for
her inability to provide a detailed account, during her asylum proceedings, of what she
experienced during her detention.
5.3
The complainant explains that the slight inconsistencies in her statements are entirely
understandable given the difficulty she has in recalling the acts of torture to which she was
subjected, the defence mechanism that allows her to distance herself from these events, the
stress, her nerves and the difficulties she had concentrating, particularly during the second
hearing, due to her mental health. Regarding her passport, she explains that she had obtained
it before becoming wanted in January 2018, that she had handed over her genuine passport
to the smuggler and that he had had a fake passport made for her. During the border check,
it was the smuggler who presented the complainant’s passport, posing as her father. The
complainant never received her genuine passport back from the smuggler. Lastly, the reason
the complainant was unable to identify the African country through which she had transited
during the asylum proceedings but did so later was simply because she was able, with the
help of therapists as part of her treatment, to recall that the country was Uganda.
5.4
The complainant is a Tamil woman from the Northern Province; she actively
participated in two demonstrations in Sri Lanka, following which she was arrested; she was
illegally detained and tortured by the Sri Lankan authorities; two members of her family (her
uncle and her father), who were members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, were
victims of enforced disappearance; she is wanted by the Sri Lankan authorities for all of these
reasons; she has been severely traumatized and suffers from complex post-traumatic stress
disorder; and she has filed an asylum application in Switzerland, where she has been living
for nearly five years. These are all further grounds for believing that she runs a personal risk
of being subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment if
returned to Sri Lanka, given her specific circumstances.
5.5
The complainant maintains that the State Party has greatly downplayed the fact that
her father and one of her uncles were members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam and
that they disappeared as a result. This fact is crucial, however, and suggests that the
complainant has ties to the movement, which means she has a distinctive profile. The fact
that she was released after her two periods of detention is not sufficient to rule out the risk
that she would be subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or
punishment if returned. Furthermore, the State Party has failed to take into account the fact
that the complainant is particularly vulnerable to harm because of her gender. Women –
particularly Tamil women and those living in the Northern and Eastern Provinces – are
especially affected by violations and acts of violence.
5.6
Lastly, the complainant argues that, contrary to the State Party’s assertion, neither the
State Secretariat for Migration nor the Federal Administrative Court took her state of health
into account. They concluded that her health issues were not serious enough – even though
doctors had noted that she was at an increased risk of suicide – and that she could resume her
treatment in Sri Lanka, without assessing whether that was actually a viable option or whether
such treatment would be appropriate for her recovery. Given the current situation, the fact
that psychiatric hospitals are in operation does not guarantee that the complainant will have
access to the psychiatric care she needs for an indefinite period. As noted in various reports,
psychiatric care in public institutions in Sri Lanka is focused primarily on prescribing
medicine; long-term follow-up and monitoring of health status and progression of a person’s
mental health condition are not possible.
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5.7
This means that the complainant will not be able to receive the regular psychotherapy
she needs. Furthermore, the complainant will likely be unable to obtain in Sri Lanka the
medication she takes for her psychiatric condition, which is absolutely essential to her. Thus,
contrary to the view taken by the State Secretariat for Migration, the complainant, as a victim
of torture, will be unable to receive the care and treatment she absolutely needs for her
rehabilitation, which will directly and tangibly put her life at risk.
Issues and proceedings before the Committee
Consideration of admissibility
6.1
Before considering any complaint submitted in a communication, the Committee must
decide whether it is admissible under article 22 of the Convention. The Committee has
ascertained, as it is required to do under article 22 (5) (a) of the Convention, that the same
matter has not been and is not being examined under another procedure of international
investigation or settlement.
6.2
The Committee notes that, in the present case, the State party has contested the
exhaustion of all available domestic remedies by the complainant because she did not request
a re-examination of her case in order to allow the competent national authorities to evaluate
the new medical report that had been presented by the complainant in her complaint to the
Committee. It then takes note of the complainant’s argument that she had already mentioned
her medical situation during the domestic proceedings. The Committee is of the view that the
new medical report does not provide new facts or evidence to support new allegations but
represent additional evidence to support her original allegations of torture and ill-treatment.
The Committee considers that the complainants’ claims before the Committee are based on
a set of facts that were examined by the authorities of the State Party and that have been
sufficiently substantiated for the purposes of admissibility.13 The Committee therefore finds
with regard to the new medical report that it is not precluded from considering the article 3
claim under article 22 (5) (b) of the Convention.
6.3
The Committee observes that the goal of the complainant in submitting the present
complaint is to avoid being deported to Sri Lanka and that, to this end, she claims that the
State Party would be in breach of its obligations under article 3 of the Convention if
deportation took place. The Committee considers that the complainant’s claims under articles
14 and 16 of the Convention are not independent claims but rather ones forming part of her
allegations regarding her personal situation in support of her claim under article 3.14 The
Committee also considers that the complainant has not substantiated that the facts as
submitted raise separate issues under articles 14 and 16 of the Convention.15 In the absence
of further explanations, the Committee considers that that aspect of the communication is
insufficiently substantiated.
6.4
The Committee notes the complainant’s claim that by deporting her to Sri Lanka, the
State Party would violate her rights under article 3 of the Convention. The Committee recalls
that, for a claim to be admissible under article 22 of the Convention and rule 113 (b) of its
rules of procedure, it must, inter alia, rise to the basic level of substantiation required for
purposes of admissibility.16 In cases involving refoulement, complainants must present an
arguable case by submitting substantiated arguments to demonstrate that the danger of being
subjected to torture upon removal is foreseeable, present, personal and real.17 In other words,
they must establish a prima facie case by providing evidence that rises to the basic level of
substantiation to support their claims.18
13 A. Sh. et al. v. Switzerland (CAT/C/63/D/717/2015), paras. 8.3 and 8.4; and V.K. v. Switzerland
(CAT/C/83/D/1153/2022), para. 6.3.
14 Harun v. Switzerland (CAT/C/65/D/758/2016), para. 8.3.
15 N.A. v. Switzerland (CAT/C/79/D/1096/2021), para. 8.3, and Harun v. Switzerland, para. 8.7.
16 Y.H. v. Sweden (CAT/C/76/D/979/2020), para. 7.4.
17 Committee against Torture, general comment No. 4 (2017), para. 38.
18 S.S. v. Australia (CAT/C/74/D/935/2019), para. 7.6.
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6.5
The Committee further recalls that it is for the courts of the States Parties to the
Convention, and not for the Committee, to evaluate the facts and evidence in a particular
case, unless it can be ascertained that the manner in which such facts and evidence were
evaluated was clearly arbitrary or amounted to a denial of justice.19 The Committee gives
considerable weight to findings of fact made by organs of the State Party concerned; 20
however, it is not bound by such findings. It follows that the Committee will make a free
assessment of the information available to it in accordance with article 22 (4) of the
Convention, taking into account all the circumstances relevant to each case.21
6.6
In the present case, the Committee observes that the State Party’s immigration and
judicial authorities thoroughly examined the facts and evidence presented by the complainant
and considered that some aspects of her account were not credible, that she had not proven
that she had attracted the attention of the Sri Lankan authorities or that she had a political
profile likely to attract their attention, and that her mental health condition did not preclude
her removal to Sri Lanka, where she would have access to adequate medical care. On this
basis, the Swiss authorities concluded that the complainant had not established the existence
of substantial grounds for believing that she would face a foreseeable, real and personal risk
of being tortured if returned to Sri Lanka.
6.7
The Committee notes that the complainant contests the State Party’s assessment of
her credibility and of the medical reports she produced. However, the Committee observes
that the complainant provided no evidence to substantiate her allegations and that the
authorities of the State Party found, after a thorough assessment of all the facts and evidence
presented at different levels of jurisdiction, that the complainant had not provided sufficient
evidence that she ran a foreseeable, personal and real risk of being tortured if returned to Sri
Lanka or that she would not have access to appropriate treatment there. Therefore, the
Committee finds that the communication does not establish that the domestic evaluation of
the facts and evidence concerning the complainant’s alleged risk of treatment contrary to the
Convention upon return to Sri Lanka suffered from any defects.22
6.8
The Committee recalls its earlier decisions in which it found claims to be manifestly
unfounded where the author of a communication failed to submit substantiated arguments
showing that the danger of being subjected to torture was foreseeable, present, personal and
real. In the light of the above, and in the absence of any further relevant information, the
Committee concludes that the complainant has failed to substantiate her claims sufficiently
for the purpose of admissibility.23
7.
The Committee therefore decides:
(a)
That the communication is inadmissible under article 22 (2) of the Convention;
(b)
That the present decision shall be communicated to the complainant and to the
State Party.
19 G.K. v. Switzerland (CAT/C/30/D/219/2002), para. 6.12; Z.S. v. Georgia (CAT/C/70/D/915/2019),
para. 7.4; and S.K. v. Australia (CAT/C/73/D/968/2019), para. 12.5.
20 T.D. v. Switzerland (CAT/C/46/D/375/2009), para. 8.7; and Alp v. Denmark (CAT/C/52/D/466/2011),
para. 8.3.
21 I.E. v. Switzerland (CAT/C/62/D/683/2015), para. 7.4. See also Committee against Torture, general
comment No. 4 (2017), para. 50.
22 S.K. v. Australia, para. 12.5.
23 Ibid., para. 12.6.