CCPR/C/121/D/2487/2014 the death of R.C. The author also provides an online article reporting that the InterCompany Employees Union requested the Government to issue the committee report on the death of R.C., and a copy of the Facebook page of the Union.26 7.4 The author also provides a letter from his priest, who conducted the funeral services for R.C., stating the following: the author was present when R.S., a cousin on his mother’s side, was shot by the police in May 2011 and he was an eyewitness to the incident, which created a huge political upheaval in the area. Many had their lives threatened by unidentified government forces and police. The author was one of the young men who was directly involved. This incident truly affected his life to the point that he had to leave Sri Lanka. He was trying to get the necessary documents to prove that he witnessed the incident, but it is really difficult because the Government itself is hiding a lot of the necessary evidence. 7.5 Finally, the author disagrees with the State party’s statement that the situation in Sri Lanka seems to have improved. In this connection, he refers to a 2015/16 country report published by Amnesty International stating that “many human rights challenges remained, including persistent use of arbitrary arrest and detention, torture and other ill-treatment, enforced disappearances and deaths in custody and a long-standing climate of impunity for these and other violations”.27 Additional observations From the State party 8.1 In its supplemental submission dated 16 March 2017, the State party reports that on 18 November 2016, the Federal Court granted the author’s application for leave to seek judicial review of the decision rejecting his application for permanent residence based on humanitarian and compassionate considerations. The author provided the Federal Court with an affidavit, sworn on 2 September 2016, in support of his application for judicial review. 8.2 The State party submits that the hearing took place on 13 February 2017. On 22 February, the Federal Court determined that the author’s arguments, according to which the humanitarian and compassionate officer had erred in his assessment of his hardship if returned to Sri Lanka and his degree of establishment in Canada, were not founded in fact and law. It therefore dismissed the author’s application for judicial review. Regarding the issue of the author’s establishment in Canada, the Federal Court found that the officer’s reasoning was clear, transparent and obviously supported by the existing evidence. Regarding the issue of hardship, the Federal Court noted that the main argument advanced by the author was related to the risks and adverse country conditions he would allegedly face upon return to Sri Lanka because of the events that had occurred in 2011. The Court noted that the officer had found that the author lacked credibility, given the inconsistencies and contradictions in his evidence and the lack of evidence supporting his claim that he had been involved in the lawsuits following the police attack, that he had provided a declaration to trade union lawyers and that he had filed a complaint after the incident. 8.3 The Federal Court found that in the affidavit filed in support of his application for leave to seek judicial review, the author purported to provide new explanations about his actions following the shooting of his alleged cousin, but that these explanations contradicted his previous statements. The Federal Court also found that there was no evidence on the record to support the author’s allegations that he was involved in the lawsuits following the police shooting. 8.4 The State party submits that the author’s allegations of risk have been thoroughly assessed by several independent and impartial State party decision makers, all of whom determined that he has not substantiated the allegations and lacked credibility. The State 26 27 “Requests made for [R.C.’s] murder report”, TNLRN News Radio online (Sri Lanka), 30 May 2016, available from www.newsradio.lk/235861-2/. See www.refworld.org/docid/56d05b1315.html. 11