3.6 The complainant claims that politically persecuted refugees are frequently without papers and that he has sufficiently proven his identity, with a photocopy of his identity card and his birth certificate. He could not be expected to obtain a passport or a new identity card by presenting himself to Sri Lankan authorities. 3.7 The complainant claims that the same matter has not been, and is not being, examined under another procedure of international investigation or settlement, and that he has exhausted domestic remedies. In particular, he claims that an extraordinary appeal to the ARK would be futile in the absence of fresh evidence. The State party’s observations on admissibility and merits 4.1 On 8 June 2001, the State party conceded that the communication is admissible; on 29 November 2001, it submitted its observations on the merits. It endorses the arguments of the Federal Office for Refugees and the Asylum Review Commission in the complainant’s case, and concludes that the complainant has failed to substantiate a real and personal risk of being subjected to torture, in the event of his return to Sri Lanka. 4.2 The State party argues that the complainant failed to submit any new elements which would justify a challenge of the decisions of the BFF and the ARK. Similarly, the evidence presented during domestic asylum proceedings (i.e. press articles, a letter from his mother and an ICRC identity card) was insufficient to substantiate his allegations of past persecution, or a future risk of torture in Sri Lanka. The medical reports confirming his post-traumatic stress disorder were based on his own account and ignored other possible, and more likely, causes for these symptoms. 4.3 While conceding that the complainant was detained at the Pettah police station in Colombo from 31 January to 22 February 1996, the State party considers this detention irrelevant for his claim that he is at risk of torture upon his return to Sri Lanka. Likewise, no such risk could be inferred from the frequent identity controls and arrests of Tamils in Sri Lanka. 4.4 The State party submits that the fact that no criminal proceedings were instituted against the complainant shows that he is not personally at risk of being tortured by the Sri Lankan security forces. For the State party, the EPRLF and TELO militia, if at all active in the Chankanai area in 1997, never showed an interest in the complainant’s own activities, but allegedly tortured him to extract information about the LTTE connection of his deceased brother, S. 4.5 Lastly, the State party argues that the complainant could prove, if returned to Sri Lanka, that he lived in Switzerland from 1997 onwards, thereby dispelling any suspicion of having collaborated with the LTTE during that time. Complainant’s comments on the State party’s submissions 5.1 On 22 December 2003, in his comments on the State party’s merits submission, counsel argues that contradictions in the complainant’s statements before the Swiss authorities resulted from a “loss of reality”. Traumatized persons often experience difficulties in remembering the details and chronology of their history. 142