CCPR/C/126/D/2989/2017 9.3 On 6 November 2017, the Vilnius regional court granted the Prosecutor General’s request to extradite the author. In considering the author’s allegations, the court took due account of the findings of the administrative courts in his asylum case, as well as the fact that he had returned to Belarus from time to time after 2009. The final decision in the author’s extradition case was made by the Lithuanian Court of Appeal on 15 December 2017. On 4 January 2018, the Office of the Prosecutor General suspended the extradition of the author until the final deliberation of the case by the Committee. 9.4 The State party submits that the relevant national legislation obliges the domestic authorities to ensure that a person is not subject to extradition if there are substantial grounds to believe that there is a real risk of irreparable harm in the requesting country. Article 9 (3) (8) of the Criminal Code and article 71 (3) (8) of the Criminal Procedure Code establish that extradition cannot take place if there exist other grounds provided for by the treaties to which the Republic of Lithuania is a party. The Covenant is among such treaties. The European Convention, with its article 3 applicable to the author’s case, is also one such treaty and has direct effect in Lithuania. National courts dealing with extradition cases are bound by the principles established in the European Convention. The State party refers to two cases in which extradition requests were denied based on the successful asylum claim of the applicants and the principle of non-refoulement. 9.5 In his allegations, the author refers to general conditions of detention in Belarus, claiming that he will be placed in SIZO No. 1 in Minsk. The State party submits that the author’s allegations are vague and abstract in nature, and that the national courts could not consider them seriously when examining his extradition case. The State party refers to the case-law of the European Court of Human Rights in similar extradition cases, in which the Court did not find a violation, stating that “reference to a general problem concerning human rights observance in a particular country cannot alone serve as a basis for refusal of extradition” and that “there is no indication that the human rights situation in Belarus is serious enough to call for [a] total ban on extradition to that country” 3 ) and that the applicant did not “refer to any individual circumstances which could substantiate his fears of ill-treatment and unfair trial”. 4 The State party concludes that the author refers to conditions in Belarus prisons in a general and unsubstantiated manner and does not indicate any individual risks related to his person, given the substance of his extradition case. Following the jurisprudence of the European Court, the domestic courts are not in a position to assess the general prison conditions in another country, in the absence of sufficient material from the author. 9.6 According to the State party, the author’s allegations about the lack of a fair trial on the basis that Belarusian public servants have already tried to extract bribes from him, are general and unsubstantiated and not linked to any individual circumstances. The State party abstained from comments on further hypothetical consequences of the author’s possible detention, considering their uncertain nature. 9.7 In conclusion, the State party states that allowing such vague references to possible human rights violations in extradition cases, such as the author’s case, to be used would severely impede the system of extradition between States. The current case is an example of the possibility of delaying extradition in cases without any sufficient material as to the individual threat against the person to be extradited. That poses a risk to the effectiveness of criminal investigations, especially when a suspect is hiding in a foreign country. Author’s further comments to the State party’s observations 10.1 In his comments dated 18 July 2018, the author raises two additional claims under articles 2 (3) (1) and 14 (1) of the Covenant, on account of the failure of the domestic courts of the State party to evaluate in substance his claims and thus their failure to provide him with an effective remedy in his extradition case. 10.2 The author states that the State party should not extradite him to Belarus because the latter has not implemented the Views of the Committee or the 2018 concluding 3 4 6 See Kamyshev v. Ukraine (application No. 3990/06), judgment of 20 August 2010, para. 44. See Puzan v. Ukraine (application No. 51243/08), judgment of 18 May 2010, para. 34.