CCPR/C/125/D/2494/2014 origin and therefore would be at risk of persecution. It did so not only when the asylum seeker had converted before the Board made its decision, but also when the conversion took place after the decision was made when the Board found a basis for reopening the proceedings and granted residence based on a specific and individual assessment of new information in each case. 14 4.9 Paragraph 36 of the Guidelines on International Protection: Religion-Based Refugee Claims under Article 1 A (2) of the 1951 Convention and/or the 1967 Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees of 28 April 2004 states, inter alia, that: “So-called ‘self-serving’ activities do not create a well-founded fear of persecution on a Convention ground in the claimant’s country of origin, if the opportunistic nature of such activities will be apparent to all, including the authorities there, and serious adverse consequences would not result if the person were returned.” In the case of X v. Denmark, the Committee observed that the author’s claim mainly relied on his “mere membership of a particular Christian church” and thus considered that the author’s claims under the Covenant were insufficiently substantiated for the purposes of admissibility (para. 4.3). The author in the present communication has provided even less information about his alleged conversion than the author in X v. Denmark: he has only submitted a document confirming his baptism and has simply stated that he has converted from Islam to Christianity. In the present communication, he has therefore failed to establish a prima facie case simply based on his certificate of baptism. His return to the Islamic Republic of Iran will not constitute a violation of articles 6 or 7 of the Covenant as a consequence of his alleged conversion to Christianity. 4.10 As to the author’s claim that on return he will be arrested and questioned by the Iranian authorities because he has been away for 15 years, the Refugee Appeals Board has not found any risk of persecution or abuse. The author does not appear to have been profiled in any way by the Iranian authorities and his claim that he allegedly risks being subjected to abuse in connection with his entry into the Islamic Republic of Iran appears to be completely unsubstantiated. The circumstance of the author’s spouse having already been granted asylum in Denmark and his claim that if he is returned to the Islamic Republic of Iran, they cannot live together as a family, cannot lead to a different assessment of his eligibility for asylum. 4.11 Regarding the author’s allegation that he did not benefit from a new hearing in violation of articles 2, 13 and 26 of the Covenant, the State party first observes that article 13 does not confer a right to a court hearing. In Maroufidou v. Sweden, the Committee did not dispute that a mere administrative “review” of the expulsion order in question was compatible with article 13. 15 When the Refugee Appeals Board has decided a case, the asylum seeker may request the Board to reopen the asylum proceedings. If the asylum seeker claims that essential new information has come to light as compared with the information available when the Board made its original decision and that this new information may result in a different decision, the Board will make an assessment of whether the new information may give rise to the reopening of the proceedings for reconsideration of the case. In the author’s case, the Board assessed the credibility of the information on conversion and found that no new information had been produced that could lead to a different decision. Based on the assessment of the new information produced by the author, it considered that the author’s conversion was not genuine. Therefore, in the absence of essential new information that could lead to a different assessment of the author’s asylum case, there was no basis for reopening the asylum proceedings, including remitting the case to the Danish Immigration Service for reconsideration. 4.12 Finally, the author has been treated no differently from any other person applying for asylum in terms of race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. He has not provided any evidence to substantiate a violation of articles 2 and 26. As regards the author’s submission that he has 14 15 6 Asylum proceedings have also been reopened following a specific and individual assessment of new information provided about an asylum seeker’s conversion in connection with a complaint to the Committee. Maroufidou v. Sweden (CCPR/C/12/D/58/1979).