Mr. Croes fails to submit any evidence in support of such allegations.
Lastly, Mr. Croes cannot claim a right to invoke article 1 of the Covenant without submitting even a beginning of
evidence to the effect that:
(a) the people of Aruba claim to be the victim of a violation of article 1 of the Covenant by the Kingdom of the
Netherlands,
(b) this people has authorized Mr. Croes to submit on its behalf a complaint under article 1 of the Covenant,
(c) the Kingdom of the Netherlands has violated article 1. In this respect, it is significant that Mr. Croes' lawyer, in
paragraph 28 of his letter of 11 January 1984, does not as yet allege an actual violation of article 1, but "a threat" to the right of
self-determination. This raises the question, whether a possible future violation of a right protected by the Covenant could be the
object of a complaint under the Optional Protocol. The Government answers this question in the negative.
For the reasons submitted in the foregoing paragraphs the Government of the Kingdom of the Netherlands submits that
the communication of Mr. Gilberto François Croes is inadmissible under rule 90, paragraphs 1 (b), 1 (c), 1 (d) and 1 (f) of the
Committee's Rules of Procedure.
6.1 Before considering any claims presented in a communication, the Human Rights Committee must, in
accordance with rule 87 of its provisional rules of procedure, decide whether or not it is admissible under the
Optional Protocol to the Covenant.
6.2 Article 5, paragraph 2 (a), of the Optional Protocol precludes the Committee from considering a
communication if the same matter is being examined under another procedure of international investigation or
settlement. There was no indication that the case was under examination elsewhere.
6.3 Article 5, paragraph 2 (b), of the Optional Protocol precludes the Committee from considering a
communication unless domestic remedies have been exhausted. In this connection, the Committee recalled that, in its
decision under rule 91 of its provisional rules of procedure, it requested the State party, in the event that the latter
were to contend that domestic remedies had not been exhausted, "to give details of the effective remedies available
in the particular circumstances of this case". The Committee noted that in its submission of 28 May 1985 the State
party contended that the author had failed to exhaust domestic remedies. It mentioned the steps taken by Mr. Croes,
but did not specify what effective local remedies would have been available in the circumstances of this case, had
Mr. Croes specifically invoked articles 6 and 14 of the Covenant in his submission of complaints to the national
authorities. The Committee noted that the steps taken by the author to exhaust domestic remedies ended with the
rejection of his appeal to the Supreme Court of the Netherlands Antilles on 24 February 1984. In the absence of any
clear indication from the State party concerning other effective domestic remedies which the author should have
pursued, the Committee concluded that it was not precluded by article 5, paragraph 2 (b), of the Optional Protocol
from considering this case, but indicated that this conclusion could be reviewed in the light of any further
information submitted by the State party under article 4, paragraph 2 of the Optional Protocol.
6.4 The Committee noted the State party's contention that the communication indicates an abuse of the right of
submission. However, the Committee found that the grounds invoked by the State party in this connection did not
appear to support such a conclusion.
7. On 25 October 1985, the Human Rights Committee therefore decided that the communication was
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