CAT/C/20/D/65/1997 page 10 settlement. The Committee was further of the opinion that all available domestic remedies had been exhausted, in view of the fact that no new circumstances existed on the basis of which the author could have filed a new application with the Aliens Appeals Board. The Committee found that no further obstacles to the admissibility of the communication existed. 9. The Committee noted that both the State Party and the author’s counsel had forwarded observations on the merits of the communication, and that the State Party had requested the Committee, if it were to find the communication admissible, to proceed to the examination of the merits of the communication. Nevertheless, the Committee considered that the information before it was not sufficient to enable it to adopt its Views. 10. In particular, the Committee wished to receive from the author’s counsel more precise and detailed information concerning the character and frequency of the author’s publications, the nature of his political activities as well as his reasons to believe that he will be subjected to torture upon his return to Djibouti. Likewise, the Committee wished to receive information from the State Party concerning its statement that the human rights situation in Djibouti had improved since the peace accord of December 1994, and how this would affect the author’s situation if he were to return. 11. Accordingly, on 20 November 1997, the Committee against Torture decided that the communication was admissible, and requested the State Party and the author’s counsel to submit their observations on the above questions so as to allow the Committee to examine the merits of the communication at its next (twentieth) session. Parties’ replies to the Committee’s decision on admissibility 12.1 By note of 28 January 1998, the State Party points out that it never suggested that the human rights situation in Djibouti had improved since the peace accord of 1994, but, on the contrary, that the general situation of human rights in Djibouti leaves much to be desired. It recalls that its arguments concerning the merits of the author's communication were mainly based on his credibility rather than on the human rights situation in Djibouti. The State Party refers to its earlier submission and maintains that the inconsistencies and peculiarities in the author's story impact on its veracity and credibility. 12.2 The State Party points out that, although the situation of human rights in Djibouti is far from satisfactory, the freedom of the press in the country is generally respected, and that the opposition issues weekly and monthly publications which are publicly critical of the regime. 13.1 By letter of 19 February 1998, counsel for the author states that the author did not publicly express any political opinion before he left Djibouti in 1987. He provides additional information about the author's activities between 1987 (when he left for Morocco) and his return to Djibouti in January 1991. After his return to Djibouti, he maintained contacts with Afar opponents of the Government and participated in the planning of political demonstrations and other political activities.