CCPR/C/125/D/2373/2014 State party’s additional observations 6.1 On 26 February 2016, the State party submitted its additional observations on admissibility and the merits, reiterating that the author’s claims had not been substantiated. 6.2 On 10 July 2015, the author had been arrested and detained for the purpose of his forced return from Denmark. On 2 August 2015, the author was forcibly returned to Afghanistan. 6.3 On 3 August 2015, the author requested the Refugee Appeals Board to reopen his asylum case. On 17 December 2015, the Board refused to reopen the author’s asylum case.11 The Board emphasized that the request for the case to be reopened and the appended statements 12 were not forwarded to it until 3 August 2015, after the applicant had been returned to Afghanistan on 2 August 2015. Since the author is no longer in Denmark, and his asylum case is considered to be closed, his current situation in Afghanistan cannot be examined. 6.4 In the period from 3 April 2014, when the Committee transmitted the applicant’s communication of 26 February 2014 to Denmark, until the receipt of the request of 3 August 2015 for the case to be reopened, when the applicant had already been removed from Denmark, the Refugee Appeals Board received no information on the applicant’s religious persuasion or activities, from either the counsel or the author, or anyone else. However, several of the statements appended to the request of 3 August 2015 for the case to be reopened relate to circumstances and events which, according to the information available, took place during the said period. This information could have been forwarded to the Board in due time before the return of the author, however it was not forwarded until after his removal. 6.5 The State party observes that, for the entire period from the hearing of the case by the Refugee Appeals Board in February 2014 until his actual deportation on 2 August 2015, the author was represented by an attorney who has very extensive experience in the hearing of asylum cases before the Board and who is aware of the importance of presenting to the Board any new information in the case as soon as possible. The counsel did not forward the said information to the Board immediately after the author was arrested on 10 July 2015 and detained for the purpose of his return, but only after his actual deportation, on 3 August 2015. The Board was not familiar with the information on the author’s religious persuasion and activities in the meantime. The State party also observes that the counsel, in his letter of 30 July 2015 to the Committee, emphasized that the applicant would be forcibly returned on 2 August 2015. It is therefore incomprehensible that the information was not forwarded to the Board until after the author’s return. The counsel and the author have not given the Board the opportunity to consider this information and to hear the applicant’s detailed statements. Neither was the information on the author’s circumstances preceding the submission of his communication to the Committee submitted until after his return on 3 August 2015. The Board also observed inconsistencies in the new information submitted in support of the request for the case to be reopened. It appears from the certificate of baptism produced that the author was baptized on 23 February 2014, 12 days after the Board hearing. Consequently, the maximum number of days from the applicant’s initial contact with a pastor in Denmark until the completion of his baptism was 23 days, which does not accord with the author’s own statements during the proceedings, nor with the statement from Reverend Frimann Hansen (annex 3) produced previously. 6.6 In response to the author’s additional comments of 2 October 2015, the State party refers to its observations of 3 October 2014, adding that the Board was familiar with the counsel’s brief of 5 February 2014 when it took its decision on 11 February 2014, and pointing to a report entitled Afghanistan: Post-Taliban Governance, Security and U.S. Policy 13 which confirms the State party’s submission concerning the author’s age and ethnicity. 11 12 13 8 The Board’s decision is appended as annex 2. Including the statement of 25 July 2015 by Susanne Krog, a minister of the Pentecostal Church. Published by the Congressional Research Service on 15 October 2015, p. 75, fig. 2.