CAT/C/60/D/648/2015 Complainant’s comments on the State party’s observations 5.1 On 2 February 2016, the complainant submitted comments on the State party’s submission. 5.2 The complainant claims that he has complied with rule 113 (b) of the Committee’s rules of procedure, having established a prima facie case. Thus, his communication is not inadmissible or without merit. 5.3 In relation to the second independent merits review, one of the complainant’s central claims was that he had twice been detained as an LTTE supporter. The reviewer found this claim not to be credible owing to a discrepancy, which the complainant submits is a minor one, over the wording of his statement, namely that he first claimed that he had seen his visa application being lodged and later that he had been in the car and watched someone else enter the High Commission with the purpose of lodging the application. The complainant submits that this question is merely a semantic one, and that watching someone about to lodge an application on your behalf and watching your visa application actually being lodged are consistent. 5.4 The reviewer also referred to the complainant’s statement that he had an informant within the High Commission, stating that this was inconsistent with his not personally knowing if his application for a visa had been lodged. The complainant submits that there is no inconsistency. His claim that his arrest by the Criminal Investigation Department indicated that there may have been an informant at the High Commission was purely speculation, and there may well have been another reason for his arrest such as his membership of a social group, payments to LTTE, etc. The complainant maintains that even if his claims about the High Commission were found to be inconsistent, his arrest by the Criminal Investigation Department is a separate matter. 5.5 Regarding perceived inconsistencies in the complainant’s evidence as to whether the “minister” referred to was in fact a minister for Negombo and whether the complainant had visited his office, the complainant states that he was told that the person was “a minister” and he assumed it was “for Negombo”. 5.6 The reviewer stated that the complainant had not provided court documents immediately upon obtaining them. The complainant submits that his previous representative misdirected him as to whether it was necessary to adduce these documents as evidence. Also, at the time the evidence was obtained the matter was before the court, so new evidence could not be introduced. The complainant requested that the Committee verify the document with the Sri Lankan authorities. The complainant draws the Committee’s attention to the statement by a registrar, which had not been available to the second reviewer, verifying the charge sheet extract and explaining the misspelling. 5.7 The reviewer had further concluded that the complainant had been inconsistent in his statements regarding the identity of his kidnappers. The complainant submits that Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (Tamiḻīḻa viṭutalaip pulikaḷ) and Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Pulikal are very similar in the Tamil language due to the word “tiger” (pulikal), and that an error had been made by his first interpreter. The groups are both Tamil and had been unified before Tamil Makkal Viduthalai Puligal splintered off. Even for Tamils, the situation can be confusing. 5.8 With reference to the fact that he did not raise in prior interviews the question of the payments he had been forced to make to LTTE, the complainant maintains that it was because the payments were not the primary reason that he feared harm; he believed that his abduction was related to his visa application. 5.9 The complainant referred to inconsistencies in the account of his escape from the Karuna group camp in 2008. He maintains that he consistently stated that there were several guards. He later clarified that there was only one guard in the immediate area at the time of his escape. He never stated that all the guards had gone to the toilet simultaneously. He states that the original reviewer implied that he had done so and he was not given an opportunity to clarify. He did so with the second reviewer, and denies that this represented a revision of his evidence. 8