CCPR/C/128/D/2689/2015 and literature at Bukhara State University. According to that decision, the author was to begin work on 26 August 2017, until a competitive examination was conducted. 8.4 By note verbale of 25 October 2018, the State party informed the Committee that, by order of the Rector of Bukhara State University, the author was employed in the Department of Foreign Languages. Issues and procedures before the Committee Consideration of admissibility 9.1 Before considering any claim contained in a communication, the Committee must decide, in accordance with rule 97 of its rules of procedure, whether the communication is admissible under the Optional Protocol. 9.2 The Committee has ascertained, as required under article 5 (2) (a) of the Optional Protocol, that the same matter is not being examined under another procedure of international investigation or settlement. 9.3 The Committee takes note of the fact that the author claims to have exhausted the available domestic remedies and that the State party does not challenge the admissibility of the communication on those grounds. The Committee therefore considers that it is not precluded under article 5 (2) (b) of the Optional Protocol from examining the present case. 9.4 The Committee also takes note of the author’s claim that the State party violated article 2 (3) of the Covenant, owing to its failure to provide her with an effective remedy in response to her complaints. The Committee recalls its jurisprudence, in which it has indicated that the provisions of article 2 of the Covenant set out general obligations for States parties; they cannot give rise to a claim under the Optional Protocol, when invoked independently. The Committee therefore considers that the author’s claims under article 2 of the Covenant are inadmissible under article 3 of the Optional Protocol. 9.5 The Committee further takes note of the author’s claim that her rights under articles 6, 15, 17, 19 and 26 of the Covenant have been violated, but that she has not provided any information or clarifications to support those claims. In the absence of any other pertinent information on file, the Committee considers that this part of the communication is inadmissible under article 2 of the Optional Protocol. 9.6 The author has claimed that the State party violated article 7 of the Covenant by becoming complicit in the inhuman and degrading treatment to which she was subjected. In support of her claim, she indicated that, following her apprehension on 9 June 2014, the investigator threatened her with physical abuse and a harsher criminal penalty if she did not cooperate and that she was not allowed to use a bathroom for over five hours. The Committee takes note of the State party’s observation, in its reply of 3 February 2017, that no facts relating to the use of torture and ill-treatment could be established in the author’s case. The Committee is of the view that, in the present case, the author has failed to provide sufficient information in substantiation of those particular claims. Accordingly, it considers that this part of the communication is inadmissible under article 2 of the Optional Protocol. 9.7 The Committee takes note of the author’s claims that the court was not independent and impartial, that the investigation was carried out in flagrant breach of criminal procedure law, that her right to legal assistance was not clearly explained, that her requests to question a witness during the trial were denied, that the court assessed evidence wrongly and in a onesided manner which favoured the victim and that both the investigation and the trial suffered from undue delays. The Committee takes note of the State party’s observations that the courts assessed the evidence adequately, qualified the author’s actions correctly and issued the sentence appropriately. 9.8 The Committee recalls that it is generally for the courts of States parties to the Covenant to review the facts and evidence, as well as the application of domestic legislation, in a particular case, unless it can be shown that such evaluation or application was clearly arbitrary or amounted to a manifest error or denial of justice or that the court otherwise 6

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