CAT/C/60/D/681/2015
beheading of his father and other brutality by the Taliban. Not surprisingly, it has been
found that he has a real fear of returning to Afghanistan. Nevertheless, he has been assessed
by a departmental officer and a reviewer as not being someone to whom Australia owes
protection. That is essentially because both the officer and the reviewer consider that it is
safe for the appellant to return to Kabul. Whilst this administrative process took place, the
appellant spent some two years in immigration detention. He has now been released into the
community and is working. … The appellant will most likely be returned to Afghanistan.
On any view this is a harsh outcome for the appellant. It must be one that is difficult for
him (and perhaps many others) to comprehend. Nonetheless, whatever one may think of the
outcome, and whatever sympathy may be felt for the appellant in all the circumstances, the
review has not been shown to have involved any legal error. There is no basis in law to
overturn it.”
4.11 Subsequently, the complainant made two requests for an assessment of the postreview protection claims with a request to the Minister to grant him a visa in the public
interest. The Department of Immigration and Border Protection determined that the
complainant’s protection claims had been comprehensively considered at the second
independent merits review and the author had not advanced any new and credible
information since that review to warrant referral to the Minister for consideration. In
relation to the author’s potential humanitarian and health issues, the Department determined
that there were no unique and exceptional circumstances in the complainant’s case.
Consequently, the complainant did not comply with section 195A of the guidelines for
referral to the Minister. However, according to the decision of the Department of 8 October
2014, “there has been a decline in the complainant’s psychological health since 2012,
related mainly to having seen his father killed and the prolonged stay in immigration
detention, in the wake of conceded errors in the previous IMR assessment”. On 16 October
2014, the Department of Human Services, by way of complex case resolution, assessed the
complainant’s case and concluded that his request for assessment under section 195A did
not meet the guidelines for referral to the Minister. In that regard, the departmental records
indicated that the complainant had an ongoing physical and mental health-care plan, which
was being monitored by the Australian Red Cross, and had been examined by a neurologist
on 27 August 2014 for convulsions and loss of consciousness. The report indicates that the
complainant suffers from anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder and that he
receives community support assistance for medical services and has access to medical
treatment as required. Notwithstanding the comparably inferior state of mental health care
in Afghanistan, “there was nothing before the Department to suggest that he would be
denied medical care or treatment for any reason, or that his condition(s) would raise his risk
profile such as to expose him to serious or significant harm in Afghanistan in the
reasonably foreseeable future”.
4.12 As regards the complainant’s reference to various media articles and reports in his
submissions in support of his claims regarding the risk of torture for returned failed asylum
seekers, and the failure of the Afghan Government to provide protection from torture, the
State party submits that the existence of a general risk of violence does not constitute a
sufficient ground for determining that a particular person would be at risk of torture upon
return to that country. Additional grounds must exist to show that the individual concerned
would be personally at risk.17 The State party has reviewed the material provided by the
author and does not consider it establishes such grounds.
State party’s additional observations on the admissibility and merits
5.1
On 31 March 2016, the State party submitted additional observations. It considers
that the author’s claims of a risk of irreparable harm have not been substantiated and
requests the Committee to lift the request for interim measures, and to expedite the
consideration of the case. Following the State party’s assessments in the context of its
interim measures request policy, it reiterates that there have been no new and credible
information in the author’s submissions and therefore no substantial grounds for believing
that he would face a real risk of torture if returned to Afghanistan.
17
6
See communication No. 83/1997, G.R.B. v. Sweden, Views adopted on 15 May 1998, para. 6.3.