104 Report of the Eminent Jurists Panel on terrorism, counter-terrorism and human rights degrading treatment.247 Most recently, the European Court of Human Rights affirmed this position clearly in its 2008 Saadi decision: “…[The Court] cannot accept the argument of the United Kingdom Government, supported by the respondent Government [Italy], that a distinction must be drawn under Article 3 (of the ECHR) between treatment inflicted directly by a signatory State and treatment that might be inflicted by the authorities of another State, and that protection against this latter form of ill-treatment should be weighed against the interests of the community as a whole. Since protection against the treatment prohibited by Article 3 is absolute, that provision imposes an obligation not to extradite or expel any person who, in the receiving country, would run the real risk of being subjected to such treatment. As the Court has repeatedly held, there can be no derogation from that rule. It must therefore reaffirm the principle stated in the Chahal judgment that it is not possible to weigh the risk of ill-treatment against the reasons put forward for the expulsion in order to determined whether the responsibility of a State is engaged under Article 3…” 248 Diplomatic assurances A number of States have argued that they can sufficiently discharge their duty under the non-refoulement principle by requiring a diplomatic assurance from the receiving country that the individual concerned will not be tortured, or suffer other serious human rights violations. The Panel received evidence on numerous occasions about States’ increasing reliance on diplomatic assurance in counter-terrorism cases; Canada, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, the UK and the USA have all relied on such assurances. The assurances, which take different forms, are claimed to reduce the risk of torture once non-nationals are deported to their country of origin, or a third country. The assurances can range from simple contacts up to Memoranda of Understanding between two sovereign countries, such as those concluded by the UK with countries such as Jordan, Libya and Lebanon.249 The European Court of Human Rights in the Saadi case cited above, did not reject the notion of diplomatic assurances entirely, but found that there was sufficient evidence of torture and ill-treatment in Tunisian detention facilities to render diplo- 247 See UN Human Rights Committee, Concluding Observations on Canada, UN Doc. CCPR/C/CAN/CO/5, 20 April 2006, para. 15; Concluding Observations on the United States of America, UN Doc. CCPR/C/USA/CO/3/ Rev.1, 18 December 2006, para. 16; Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, Theo van Boven, Report of the Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, UN Doc. A/59/324, 1 September 2004; UN Committee against Torture, Concluding Observations on Canada, CAT/C/CR/34/CAN, 7 July 2005, para. 4; and Views of 20 May 2005, Agiza v. Sweden, Communication No. 233/2003, UN Doc. CAT/C/34/D/233/2003 (2005). 248 ECtHR, Judgment of 28 February 2008, Saadi v. Italy, Application No. 37201/06, para. 138. 249 Memorandum of Understandings were signed between the UK and Jordan (10 August 2005), with Libya (18 October 2005), and Lebanon (23 December 2005). See also written submission of the Government of the United Kingdom to the EJP United Kingdom Hearing.