CAT/C/32/D/183/2001
Page 8
treatment either, even if his claim regarding the lack of appropriate medical treatment
in India were substantiated.
4.7
In the alternative, if the complaint should be declared admissible, the State
party requests the Committee to dismiss it on the merits, based on the same reasons as
set out above.
4.8
With respect to the risk assessment by the Canadian immigration authorities,
the State party submits that immigration officers are specially trained to assess the
situation in the country of origin of refugee claimants and to apply domestic Canadian
as well as human rights law including the Convention Against Torture. The State
party considers the remedy of judicial review an adequate safeguard for the
immigration officers’ “relative lack of independence”.
4.9
Lastly, the State party argues that the Committee should not substitute its own
finding on whether there were substantial grounds for believing that the complainant
would be at risk of being tortured if returned to India, since the national proceedings
before the immigration and Refugee Board, as well as the Federal Court, do not
disclose a manifest error or unreasonableness or any other irregularity, the evaluation
of facts and evidence being a matter reserved to the national courts.
Complainant’s comments:
5.1
In his comments dated 30 March 2002 on the State party’s submission, the
complainant reiterates that he would run a risk of being tortured, or even executed, if
he were to be returned to India. He submits that some of the evidence supplied by the
complainant was entirely ignored or belittled in the State party’s submission, such as
the investigation report by Mr. S.S., several newspaper articles and the Chahal
judgment of the European Court of Human Rights, while other documents, in
particular the arrest warrant and the article from the Vancouver weekly which
explicitly mentioned the complainant, were not recognized as being authentic. Since
all documents had been submitted in original to the Canadian authorities, it would
have been easy for the State party to verify their authenticity.
5.2
The complainant submits that the State party seeks to undermine his credibility
on secondary grounds, such as his delay in making a refugee claim, his failure to
claim refugee status in the United States, the fact that he was issued a passport by the
Indian consulate in New York, and the date of his arrest warrant, which are
insufficient to refute the well-documented risk of torture in this case. Counsel submits
that the complainant, in order to obtain a document to prove his identity, paid 500 $ to
a Mr. S. to collect his passport at the Indian consulate in New York. With regard to
the date of the arrest warrant, the complainant states that he does not know why it had
been issued two years after his departure from India and that a possible explanation
may lie in events in the Punjab of which he is not aware.
5.3
With respect to the medical and psychological reports, the complainant
submits that these documents clearly establish he had been tortured, a fact which has
never been seriously denied by the State party. The complainant denies the State
party’s allegation that the reports were only presented at a late stage of the