PART 2: How to Bring a Case to the Court ex officio and concluded that the applicant had been subjected to degrading treatment in violation of Article 3.255 The Court will also strike an application out if the applicant fails to respond to letters and/or fails to submit his or her observations and any other documents requested by the Court. The applicant’s inactivity is interpreted as a lack of intention on his or her part to pursue the case. Before striking the case out in such a situation, the Court will give the applicant adequate opportunities to reply and will warn him or her in a letter – sent by registered post – of the possibility that the case might be struck out of the Court’s list.256 The case of Nehru v. the Netherlands illustrates the fact that in situations where the Court is unable to contact an applicant over an extended period of time – in this case almost 3 years – the Court is likely to consider the application to have been abandoned. In Nehru, the applicant, a Sri Lankan national, whose request for an interim measure under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court to suspend his expulsion had been rejected by the Court on 10 November 1999, was deported to Canada by the Netherlands authorities on 18 November 1999. A day later, on 19 November 1999, the applicant was deported from Canada to Sri Lanka. Nothing further was heard from him either by his lawyer or by the Court. In its decision of 27 August 2002, the Court noted that it could neither find that the applicant no longer wished to pursue his application nor that the matter had been resolved. It went on to state the following: Although the Court would not exclude that an expulsion carried out speedily might frustrate an applicant’s attempts to obtain the protection to which he or she is entitled under the Convention, the Court notes that there is no indication that the applicant, during the period that has elapsed since his expulsion from the Netherlands, has sought in one way or another to contact his lawyer in the Netherlands in relation to his application. In these circumstances, the Court cannot but conclude that there is no indication whatsoever that the applicant intends to pursue his application.257 Consequently, the Court decided to strike the case out of its list on the basis of Article 37 of the Convention. b) Resolution of the Matter (Article 37 § 1 (b)) In its judgment in the case of Ohlen v. Denmark, the Court stated that [i]n order to conclude that the matter has been resolved within the meaning of Article 37 § 1 (b) or that for any other reason established by the Court, it is no longer justified to continue the examination of the application within the meaning of Article 37 § 1 255 Ibid., § 35. 256 See e.g. Starodub v. Ukraine (dec.), no. 5483/02, 7 June 2005, in which the applicant failed to respond to the Court’s letter for more than a year and a half. 257 Nehru v. the Netherlands (dec.), no. 52676/99, 27 August 2002. 93