83. Also at its thirty-ninth session, the Committee adopted Views on complaints
Nos. 269/2005 (Ali Ben Salem v. Tunisia), 297/2006 (Sogi v. Canada), 299/2006
(Iya v. Switzerland), 303/2006 (T.A. v. Sweden). The text of these decisions is reproduced
in annex XI, section A, to the present report.
84. Complaint No. 269/2005 (Ali Ben Salem v. Tunisia), concerned a Tunisian national who
alleged having been involved in human rights activities in Tunisia. His claims of having been
subjected by the Tunisian police to severe pain and suffering were corroborated by medical
certificates and other evidentiary materials. Despite abundant evidence that public officials had
perpetrated the acts in question, the State party failed to carry out a prompt and impartial
investigation. The Committee found a violation of the complainant’s right to have his case
promptly and impartially investigated by the State party’s competent authorities, as well as of the
right to obtain compensation. The Committee considered that the acts to which the complainant
was subjected amounted to acts of torture within the meaning of article 1 of the Convention. It
also considered that a delay of more than seven years before an investigation was initiated into
allegations of torture was unreasonably long and did not meet the requirements of article 12 of
the Convention. It also concluded that the State party did not fulfil its obligations under
articles 13 and 14 of the Convention.
85. Complaint No. 297/2006 (Sogi v. Canada) concerned an Indian national accused of being a
member of a Sikh militant terrorist organization, who alleged having been arrested and tortured
several times in India on the basis of his alleged affiliation. He sought asylum in Canada, where
his request for protection was denied on the ground of his membership in the Babbar Khalsa
International terrorist group, which posed a threat to Canada’s national security. The
complainant was deported to India after being held under arrest for nearly four years, on the
basis of secret evidence, and was never allowed to know the charges or evidence against him.
The Committee had requested the State party not to deport him while the case was under
consideration by the Committee. The State party justified the decision by the fact that the
complainant had failed to establish that he faced a substantial risk of torture in his country of
origin. The complainant’s counsel reported that he was arrested by Indian police on arrival at the
airport, taken to the Gurdaspur police station where he had been beaten and ill-treated, and
subsequently charged with having supplied explosives to a person who had been convicted under
Canadian law. The Committee established that, by the time he was returned to India, the
complainant had provided sufficient evidence to the State party’s authorities to show that he ran
a personal, real and foreseeable risk of being subjected to torture if he was returned to India.
Furthermore, the complainant did not enjoy the necessary guarantees in the pre-removal
procedure in Canada. Consequently, the Committee found that, by sending him back to India
despite the Committee’s repeated requests for interim measures, the State party had committed a
breach of its obligations under articles 3 and 22 of the Convention.
86. In its views on complaint No. 299/2006 (Iya v. Switzerland), the Committee considered
that the complainant’s case had never been examined on the merits by the State party’s
competent authorities, as they had twice rejected his asylum request merely on the basis of his
failure to submit identity documents within the initial deadline. The complainant’s two requests
to reopen the procedures had also been rejected on procedural grounds. The Committee took into
account that the State party had not presented sufficiently substantiated arguments to challenge
the validity of the complainant’s evidence and his declarations. It found that the complainant’s
political activities as a journalist and as a militant of a political opposition party in the
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