248.Complainants frequently request preventive protection, particularly in cases concerning imminent expulsion or extradition, and invoke in this connection article 3 of the Convention. Pursuant to rule 108, paragraph 1, of the rules of procedure, at any time after the receipt of a complaint, the Committee, its working group, or the Rapporteur for new complaints and interim measures may transmit to the State party concerned a request that it take such interim measures as the Committee considers necessary to avoid irreparable damage to the victim or victims of the alleged violations. The State party shall be informed that such a request does not imply a determination of the admissibility or the merits of the complaint. The Rapporteur for new complaints and interim measures regularly monitors compliance with the Committee’s requests for interim measures. The State party may inform the Committee that the reasons for the interim measures have lapsed or present arguments why the interim measures should be lifted. The Rapporteur, the Committee or its working group may withdraw the request for interim measures. 249.The Rapporteur for new complaints and interim measures has developed the working methods regarding the withdrawal of requests for interim measures. Where the circumstances suggest that a request for interim measures may be reviewed before the consideration of the merits, a standard sentence should be added to such a request, stating that the request is made on the basis of the information contained in the complainant’s submission and may be reviewed, at the initiative of the State party, in the light of information and comments received from the State party and any further comments, if any, from the complainant. 250.Conversely, in a case registered during the reporting period, interim measures were initially denied to the complainants, in the absence of sufficient information which would have justified a request under rule 108, paragraph 1, of the rules of procedure. Subsequently, however, the Rapporteur for new complaints and interim measures requested the State party not to return the complainants to their country of origin, in the light of additional information provided by them. 251.During the period under review, the Rapporteur requested States parties to defer expulsion, deportation or extradition in a number of cases so as to allow the Committee to consider the complaints under the Committee’s procedure. All States parties so requested acceded to the Committee’s requests for deferral. In nine deportation/expulsion cases registered during the reporting period, the Rapporteur, after careful examination of the submissions, did not consider it necessary to request interim measures from the States parties concerned in order to avoid irreparable damage to the complainants upon return to their countries of origin. C. Progress of work 252.At the time of adoption of the present report the Committee had registered 249 complaints with respect to 23 countries. Of them, 59 complaints had been discontinued and 44 had been declared inadmissible. The Committee had adopted final decisions on the merits with respect to 99 complaints and found violations of the Convention in 25 of them. Overall, 47 complaints remained pending for consideration. 253.At its thirty-first session, the Committee declared one complaint admissible, to be considered on the merits, and declared inadmissible complaint No. 236/2003 (A.T.A. v. Switzerland). 254.Also at its thirty-first session, the Committee adopted decisions on the merits in respect of complaints Nos. 153/2000 (Z.T. v. Australia), 186/2001 (K.K. v. Switzerland), 187/2001 (Thabti v. Tunisia), 188/2001 (Abdelli v. Tunisia), 189/2001 (Ltaief v. Tunisia), 199/2001 (H.A. v. Sweden), 203/2002 (A.R v. The Netherlands), 209/2002 (M.O. v. Denmark), 210/2002 (V.R. v. Denmark), 213/2002 (E.J.V.M. v. Sweden), 215/2002 (J.A.G.V. v. Sweden) and 228/2003 (T.M. v. Sweden). The text of these decisions is reproduced in annex VII to the present report. 255.In its decisions on complaints Nos. 153/2000 (Z.T. v. Australia), 186/2001 (K.K. v. Switzerland), 203/2002 (A.R. v. The Netherlands), 209/2002 (M.O. v. Denmark), 210/2002 (V.R. v. Denmark), 213/2002 (E.J.V.M. v. Sweden) and 215/2002 (J.A.G.V. v. Sweden), the Committee considered that the complainants had not established that they would face a foreseeable, real and personal risk of being tortured upon return to their countries of origin. The Committee therefore concluded in each case that the removal of the complainants to those countries would not breach article 3 of the Convention. 256.In its decision on complaint No. 199/2001 (H.A. v. Sweden), the complainant claimed that her expulsion to Egypt would expose her to a risk of torture, given that her husband had been expelled to that country on grounds of his alleged involvement in terrorist activities. The Committee found that, in the light of assurances provided by the receiving State, Egypt, concerning the complainant’s and her husband’s treatment after return, as well as the State party’s own undertaking regularly to monitor the complainant’s situation by visits of its embassy or consular staff, the complainant had not made a case that her expulsion would violate article 3 of the Convention. 257.In its decision on complaint No. 228/2003 (T.M. v. Sweden), the Committee found that the complainant’s expulsion to Bangladesh, where he had allegedly been tortured as a member of an illegal political party, did not amount to a violation of article 3 of the Convention, given the fact that six years had lapsed since the alleged torture had taken place and that the complainant’s own political party now was part of the Government in Bangladesh. Furthermore, the Committee declared inadmissible ratione materiae the claim that the complainant’s removal would expose him to possible ill-treatment in Bangladesh, in violation of articles 2 and 16 of the Convention, and observed that the scope of the non-refoulement obligation in article 3 does not extend to situations of illtreatment envisaged in article 16. It also considered that the complainant had not sufficiently substantiated, for purposes of admissibility, that his prompt removal from Sweden, despite mental health problems, violated article 16 of the Convention; in this respect, it considered that the aggravation of an individual’s physical or mental health through deportation is generally insufficient to amount to degrading treatment within the meaning of this provision, and that the complainant had failed to demonstrate that appropriate medical care was unavailable in Bangladesh. 258.In its decisions on complaints Nos. 187/2001 (Thabti v. Tunisia), 188/2001 (Abdelli v. Tunisia) and 189/2001 (Ltaief v. Tunisia), the Committee considered that the State party’s failure to investigate the complainants’ detailed torture allegations made before the judicial authorities, in connection with their trials for participation in an attempted coup d’état or support of an illegal organization, amounted to a violation of articles 12 and 13 of the Convention. It emphasized that the obligation, in article 13, promptly