CAT/C/58/D/600/2014
protection visa. The complainant also claims that returnees who are believed to have
departed in breach of the Sri Lanka Immigrants and Emigrants Act are arrested at the
airport and brought before a court to apply for bail and might be placed in Negombo
prison, possibly for some days until a bail hearing date becomes available.
7.6
The Committee also notes the State party’s assertions that, in the present case, the
complainant has not provided any new credible evidence in his submissions to the
Committee; he has failed to substantiate that there was a foreseeable, real and personal risk
that he would be subjected to torture by the Sri Lankan authorities if he were to be returned
to his country of origin; his claims have been thoroughly considered by a number of
domestic decision makers, including the Refugee Review Tribunal, and subjected to
judicial review by the Federal Circuit Court and the Federal Court of Australia; and each
body specifically considered the claims and determined that they were not credible. With
reference to the decision of the Tribunal and the ministerial intervention assessment, the
State party also argues that failed asylum seekers and Tamils are not specifically targeted
for adverse attention by the Sri Lankan authorities at the time of entry into the country
and that there was no evidence to support a finding that the complainant had issues that
would draw additional scrutiny or attention to him on his return or that would delay his
release after security checks on his return to Sri Lanka.
7.7
In this context, the Committee refers to its concluding observations on the combined
third and fourth periodic reports of Sri Lanka, 11 in which it expressed serious concern about
reports suggesting that torture and ill-treatment perpetrated by State actors in Sri Lanka,
both the military and the police, had continued in many parts of the country after the
conflict with the LTTE had ended in May 2009.12 The Committee also refers to its
concluding observations on the fifth periodic report of the United Kingdom of Great Britain
and Northern Ireland, in which it had noted evidence that some Sri Lankan Tamils had been
victims of torture and ill-treatment following their forced or voluntary removal from the
State party to Sri Lanka.13
7.8
In the present case, the Committee notes that the information submitted by the
complainant regarding the events in Sri Lanka that led to his leaving the country were
thoroughly evaluated by the State party’s authorities, who found it insufficient to show
that he was in need of protection. The Committee also notes that the complainant has not
presented any evidence in support of his claims that the Sri Lanka Army or the Criminal
Investigation Department are interested in him; that his fears regarding the soldiers whom
he claims committed a murder and the investigation related to it are based on speculation;
and that his family continues to live in their village and do not seem to have been disturbed
by persons looking for him. The Committee further notes that, despite the complainant
being a Tamil originating from the area previously controlled by LTTE, the Sri Lankan
authorities did not suspected him of having any links with LTTE prior to his departure from
the country. Although the complainant disagrees with the assessment of his accounts by the
State party’s authorities, he has failed to demonstrate that the decision to refuse him a
protection visa was clearly arbitrary or amounted to a denial of justice.
7.9
The Committee recalls its general comment No. 1, according to which the burden of
presenting an arguable case lies with the complainant. In the Committee’s opinion, in the
present case, the complainant has not discharged this burden of proof.14
11
12
13
14
See CAT/C/LKA/CO/3-4.
Ibid., para. 6.
See CAT/C/GBR/CO/5, para. 20.
See communication No. 429/2010, Sivagnanaratnam v. Denmark, decision adopted on 11 November
2013, paras. 10.5-10.6.
11