CAT/C/53/D/511/2012
properly served with a notice to appear, but the respondents did not appear for the court
hearing. On 14 November 2008, the Supreme Court of New South Wales ruled that it lacks
jurisdiction over the respondents. On 5 October 2010, the complainant appealed that
decision before the New South Wales Court of Appeal, which dismissed the appeal on the
ground that, under the Foreign States Immunities Act of 1985, foreign government officials
enjoy immunity from civil liability for torture. The complainant sought special leave to
appeal to the High Court of Australia, which dismissed her application on 13 May 2011.4
Accordingly, the complainant claims to have exhausted all available remedies in Australia,
and further claims that there is no remedy possible in China.5
The complaint
3.1
The complainant alleges that the State party has violated article 14 of the
Convention by failing to provide her with an enforceable right to redress and compensation
for the State-inflicted torture she endured in China. The complainant argues that the
protections of article 14 are not limited to acts of torture committed within a State party’s
territory, because: (a) there is no express territorial limitation anywhere in the text of
article 14; (b) the context of the Convention as a whole suggests that no territorial
qualification was intended, since elsewhere express words are used to indicate a territorial
limitation,6 and since clear extraterritorial obligations are not indicated with express
wording such as “whether committed within the State party’s territory or not”;7 (c) the
object and purpose of the Convention support extraterritorial application of article 14, since
the preamble sets forth the purpose of making “more effective” the struggle against the acts
proscribed in the Convention; (d) the travaux préparatoires do not support reading a
territorial qualification into article 14, because the words “committed in any territory under
its jurisdiction” after the word “torture” were deleted from the text of article 14 during
drafting, and nothing in the drafting history indicates that article 14 protects solely against
proscribed acts committed in the territory of the respective State party;8 (e) the Committee
has pronounced in favour of the extraterritorial scope of article 14;9 and (f) the
extraterritorial interpretation of article 14 enjoys widespread support among experts.10
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
The complainant provides a copy of the Court of Appeal decision.
To support her claim that she is unable to obtain redress in China, the complainant provides a
statement dated 8 March 2007 from Yuan Hongbing, a law professor who states that “it is absolutely
impossible for Falun Gong practitioners to seek for any legal remedy or protection of law in China”.
The complainant refers to articles 2, paragraph 1; 5, paragraph 1 (a); 11; 12; 13; and 20, paragraph 1.
The complainant refers to articles 6, paragraph 1; 10; and 15.
The complainant cites Manfred Nowak, “Torture and Enforced Disappearance”, in Catarina Krause
and Martin Scheinin (eds.), International Protection of Human Rights: A Textbook (Turku College of
Human Rights, Abo Akademi University, 2009), pp. 169–170; and J. Herman Burgers and Hans
Danelius, The United Nations Convention against Torture: A Handbook on the Convention against
Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (Dordrecht, Martinus
Nijhoff, 1998), p. 94.
The complainant cites CAT/C/SR.646 /Add.1, paras. 41–44, 74 (referring to the Committee’s
consideration of Canadian compliance with article 14 following the country’s decision in Bouzari et
al. v. Islamic Republic of Iran (2004) 71 OR (3d) 675, para. 80); concluding observations on Canada,
CAT/C/CR/34/CAN (7 July 2005), paras. 4 (g) and 5 (f); and an unspecified working document on
article 14 issued at the Committee’s forty-sixth session between 9 May and 3 June 2011, section 20
(stating that obligations under article 14 are not limited to victims who were harmed in the territory of
the State party).
The complainant cites Christopher Keith Hall, “The Duty of States Parties to the Convention against
Torture to provide procedures permitting victims to recover reparations for torture committed
abroad”, European Journal of International Law, vol. 18, No. 5 (2008), p. 921; K.C. Randall, Federal
Courts and the International Human Rights Paradigm (Durham and London, Duke University Press,
7