CCPR/C/112/D/2031/2011 The complaint 3.1 The author argues that his father was the victim of enforced disappearance and, therefore, of a violation of his rights under articles 6; 7; 9; 10 and 16, alone and read in conjunction with article 2, paragraph 3, of the Covenant. 3.2 The author’s father was arbitrarily deprived of his liberty by the police and members of the army in civilian clothes in the presence of numerous eye-witnesses. Despite the fact that he was last seen alive in life-threatening circumstances in the hands of agents of the State party and that his deprivation of liberty was promptly denounced by his wife, the authorities initially denied that his deprivation of liberty had occurred, and later alleged that he was killed by crossfire in Simpani. The arbitrary arrest, ill-treatment and subsequent enforced disappearance of the author’s father was perpetrated in a context of widespread and systematic practice. In that respect, the author argues that the placement of persons deprived of their liberty under the control of State agents or of persons acting with the authorization, support or acquiescence of the State, who commit acts of torture or arbitrary killing, amounts, by itself, to a breach of the obligation to prevent violations of the right to life and to personal integrity, even when it is not possible to demonstrate that acts of torture or deprivation of life actually took place in the specific case. 3.3 Numerous eye-witnesses saw the author’s father being severely beaten by the police and members of the armed forces on 31 December 2001, upon his arrival at the bus station of Manange Chautara in Besishahar. Likewise, people who were held at the District Police Office at the end of December 2001 testified that he was tortured and severely ill-treated by the guards at the detention facility. That conduct constitutes a violation of article 7 of the Covenant. His enforced disappearance and the degree of suffering involved in being held without contact with the outside world also amounts to a violation of article 7. In this regard, the author submits that the violations suffered by his father have to be considered within the general context of human rights violations existing in the State party,3 taking into account that the most serious violations of physical and psychological integrity were systematically committed against those suspected of being Maoists. 3.4 After his arbitrary arrest, the author’s father was taken to the District Police Office and there detained without any legal grounds being put forward, in violation of his rights under article 9 of the Covenant. His detention was not entered in any official register or record and his relatives have not seen him since. He was never brought before a judge, or any other official authorized by law to exercise judicial power, nor could he take proceedings before a court to challenge the lawfulness of his detention. The unacknowledged incommunicado detention of any individual constitutes a violation of article 9 of the Covenant. 3.5 The author’s father did not have the possibility of communicating with the outside world and, according to the above-mentioned credible eye-witnesses, he was subjected to torture. Furthermore, it is a matter of fact that the conditions endured by those held in pretrial detention during the armed conflict were inhumane and degrading. 4 Therefore, his enforced disappearance and the conditions he was subjected to constitute by themselves violations of article 10 of the Covenant. 3.6 The enforced disappearance of the author’s father and the failure by the authorities to conduct an effective investigation concerning his whereabouts and fate, have maintained him outside the protection of the law since 31 December 2001, preventing him from 3 4 6 The author refers to E/CN.4/2006/6/Add.5, paras. 3 and 26; and concluding observations of the Committee against Torture, CAT/C/NPL/CO/2, paras. 13 and 24. CAT/C/NPL/CO/2, paras. 28 and 31.