OTHMAN (ABU QATADA) v. THE UNITED KINGDOM JUDGMENT 87 i. Does a real risk of the admission of torture evidence suffice? 272. In determining this question, the Court would begin by noting that the evidence before it that Abu Hawsher and Al-Hamasher were tortured is even more compelling than at the time of SIAC’s determination. The report of Mr Al-Khalili and Mr Najdawi is, for the most part, balanced and objective. It frankly assesses the strengths and weaknesses of the Jordanian State Security Court system and recognises the GID’s attempts to extract confessions from suspects. However, the main weakness in the report is that its authors do not examine for themselves the allegations of torture which were made by the applicant’s co-defendants; the report merely records the conclusions of the State Security Court at each trial that the co-defendants were not tortured. Ms Refahi, on the other hand, travelled twice to Jordan to interview the lawyers and defendants at the original trials. Her two statements give detailed accounts of her interviews and record, in clear and specific terms, the allegations of torture made by the defendants. There is every reason to prefer her evidence on this point to the more generalised conclusions of Mr Al-Khalili and Mr Najdawi. Furthermore, in the millennium conspiracy trial, some corroboration for Abu Hawsher’s allegations must be found in Amnesty International’s report of 2006 which sets out its findings that four of the defendants, including Abu Hawsher were tortured. The allegations of ill-treatment of one co-defendant, Ra-ed Hijazi are particularly convincing, not least because several witnesses were reported to have seen him propped up by two guards at the crime scene reconstruction and, as recorded in Ms Peirce’s statement, his treatment appears to have been the subject of a diplomatic protest by the United States (see paragraphs 103 and 114 above). Finally, some reliance must be placed on the fact that torture is widespread and routine in Jordan. If anything, it was worse when the applicant’s co-defendants were detained and interrogated. The systemic nature of torture by the GID (both then and now) can only provide further corroboration for the specific and detailed allegations which were made by Abu Hawsher and Al-Hamasher. 273. However, even accepting that there is still only a real risk that the evidence against the applicant was obtained by torture, for the following reasons, the Court considers it would be unfair to impose any higher burden of proof on him. 274. First, the Court does not consider that the balance of probabilities test, as applied by the majority of the House of Lords in A. and Others (no. 2), is appropriate in this context. That case concerned proceedings before SIAC to determine whether the Secretary of State’s suspicions that an individual was involved in terrorism were correct. Those proceedings were very different from criminal proceedings where, as in the present case, a defendant might face a very long sentence of imprisonment if convicted. In any event, the majority of the House of Lords in A and others (no. 2) found that the balance of probabilities test was for SIAC itself to apply: an