Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. He is represented by counsel. 1.2On 10 January 2002, the Committee forwarded the communication to the State party for comments and requested it, under rule 108, paragraph 1, of its rules of procedure not to return the complainant to Sri Lanka while his communication was under consideration by the Committee. The State party has acceded to this request. The facts as submitted by the complainant 2.1The complainant was a member of the People’s Liberation Organization of Tamil Eelam (PLOTE) until 1985, when the organization was forbidden by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). In 1985, LTTE arrested the complainant and detained him for four months, during which he was interrogated about the location of PLOTE weapons. Subsequently, LTTE interrogated him on several occasions. 2.2During this period, the complainant was working as a bus conductor and travelling between areas controlled by LTTE and by the Sri Lankan army. In view of his occupation and the fact that he was no longer a member, PLOTE suspected him of cooperating with LTTE and informed the Sri Lankan army of their suspicion.2.3In March 1987, the complainant was arrested by the Sri Lankan army and detained for almost two years. During his detention, the complainant was allegedly tortured on a regular basis for a period of six months. He was beaten, kicked, hung in the “chicken position” where he was left to hang from his left shoulder, his genitals were “injured”, his hands were burned with a hot object, and he was given electrical shocks while cold water was poured over him. 2.4After his release on 2 January 1989, the complainant was rearrested and interrogated three or four times, for up to three days each, by the Indian Peace Keeping Force (IPKF). He was also interrogated by the LTTE in order to find out what he had told IPKF about members of LTTE. 2.5In June 1989, the complainant escaped to Germany, where he applied for asylum. His application was rejected, and he immediately attempted to go to France. French police arrested him and returned him to Germany. From Germany, he was returned to Sri Lanka in July 1989. On his return, he stayed in the LTTE controlled area of Jaffna until 1995. He was interrogated several times by LTTE to find out whether he had any connections with PLOTE. 2.6In 1996, after the Sri Lankan army occupied Jaffna, the complainant escaped to Vanni, where he lived with relatives, and then moved on to Hatton. During his time in Hatton, he was arrested twice by the Sri Lankan army, as he was new in the area. In 1998, he was arrested by the Sri Lankan police and detained for three months on suspicion of being an LTTE member. During his detention he was severely beaten; he remains scarred on his lips and behind his ear, as a result of being hit by a gun. In March 1998, after bribing the police, he was released. 2.7After his release, the complainant escaped through Russia to Finland where he arrived on 21 December 1998. He immediately applied for asylum. On 12 February 2001, the Directorate of Immigration rejected his application and issued a deportation order against him. On 13 November 2001, the Helsinki Administrative Court rejected his appeal. The complainant then applied for leave to appeal and suspension of the deportation order to the Supreme Administrative Court. On 31 December 2001, his application was rejected. 2.8The complainant underwent several physical and psychological examinations after his arrival in Finland. He has submitted six medical reports, three on his physical condition and three on his psychological state, two of them refer to scars on his lip and behind his left ear. A third states that he suffers from post traumatic stress disorder, that he has a shoulder injury which fits the description of having been hung from one arm, and that he has mental and physical traumas and scars which were “possibly caused by torture”. The claim 3.1The complainant claims to have exhausted domestic remedies with the dismissal of his application by the Supreme Administrative Court for leave to appeal against the deportation order.b 3.2The complainant claims that there are substantial grounds to believe that he would be subjected to torture if returned to Sri Lanka, in violation of article 3 of the Convention. He stresses that the human rights situation in Sri Lanka continues to be poor, particularly as concerns members of the Tamil population, and that persons suspected of LTTE membership are in danger of disappearing and being arbitrarily detained and tortured. The State party’s observations on the admissibility and merits 4.1On 8 March 2002, the State party submitted that it has no objections to the admissibility of the case. On 9 July 2002, it submitted its observations on the merits. The State party contests the complainant’s version of the facts as partly inaccurate, in particular his statements relating to his application for asylum in Germany and the events thereafter. It directs the Committee to the decision of the Directorate of Immigration which is alleged to refer to a number of inconsistencies in the complainant’s description of events. The State party submits that the complainant’s claims have been considered fairly in the domestic proceedings. It refers to particular asylum cases where the Supreme Court repealed its decision on deportation, to demonstrate that every case is assessed on its relevant circumstances. 4.2By decision of 22 October 2001, the Directorate of Immigration assessed the complainant’s personal situation. It found that the course of events from 1983 to 1989 had no immediate impact on the complainant’s decision to leave his country of origin. According to the complainant, he returned to his home town, Jaffna, after his application for asylum had been refused by the German authorities. He resided there without problems until 1996, when the Sri Lankan army occupied Jaffna and most of the local residents had to move to Vanni. The alleged torture, which took place approximately 10 years before the complainant arrived in Finland, does not as such provide substantial grounds for believing that the complainant would still be in danger of being subjected to torture.