CAT/C/62/D/722/2015
parts of the country, provided that they have strong and close links in those other areas. The
complainant claims that he has no strong or close links in other areas of the country.
3.3
The complainant maintains that if he is deported, there is a real risk that he would be
tortured. He claims that as a person from the South Kivu region who has been subjected to
abuse by the authorities and who has subsequently been sought by them, he will be in great
danger and at risk of torture or ill-treatment if he is returned to his home country. He quotes
reports from non-governmental organizations, according to which different armed groups
continue to carry out brutal attacks on civilians in the Eastern part of the country, including
in South Kivu.4 He also mentions that torture and ill-treatment are endemic throughout the
country and that perpetrators are not held accountable. 5
State party’s observations on admissibility and the merits
4.1
On 12 February, 18 March and 24 June 2016, the State party provided its
observations on admissibility and the merits of the complaint. It submits that the
complainant entered Norway on 29 July 2011. When police registered the complainant, he
indicated that he “had no criminal record” and that “he was not politically active in his
home country”. He was not in possession of a passport or any other travel documents.
4.2
An asylum interview was conducted on 30 August 2011. The Committee should
take note of a number of “conspicuous claims” made by the complainant. He claims, for
example, that he was captured by Interahamwe militia while driving to Shabunda, but he
was not able to provide details about the drive. He claimed that he lived in the militia camp
from January to May 2010, but was not able to describe the camp. According to the
complainant, his brother had to pay a bribe to free him from prison in October 2010. The
complainant could not, however, state the amount of the bribe. Following a detailed
assessment in the light of available country information, the application for asylum was
rejected by the Directorate of Immigration on 16 September 2011.
4.3
The Directorate “did not conclude on the veracity of the complainant’s information
about his identity”, regarding his claims, for example, that he was originally from the
eastern Congo and it noted that the complainant in his application for asylum made general
statements and included few details about his time with the Interahamwe and in prison in
Bukavu. The Directorate decided that even on the basis of the information he had provided,
the complainant could receive effective protection elsewhere in the country.
4.4
The State party refers to the 2007 report by the Norwegian Country of Origin
Information Centre on the human rights situation in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
The State party submits that the complainant was not a high-profile critic of the regime or a
rebel. The authorities in the Democratic Republic of the Congo have no computerized
system of registering and monitoring rebels or previously detained persons. It is a large
country that does not require identity cards to be carried.
4.5
On 22 August 2013, the Immigration Appeals Board rejected an appeal submitted by
the complainant. It concluded that the complainant could safely return to the “governmentcontrolled areas in the west” of the country. In particular, the Board was of the opinion that
the complainant could return to Kinshasa, a “multi-ethnic city, where the complainant’s
ethnicity would not pose a problem”. The complainant was given until 24 September 2013
to leave the country, but failed to comply. The State party wishes to emphasize that the
decision of 22 August 2013 was the final decision in the case and rejects the claims that the
consideration took almost five years as claimed by the complainant. The State party recalls
that the initial application was rejected on 16 September 2011, so the case took only two
years.
4
5
See Human Rights Watch, World Report 2015 and Amnesty International report 2014/2015, The State
of the World’s Human Rights.
The author claims that the Amnesty International report for 2016/2017 indicates that torture and illtreatment often take place during unlawful arrests and detention by the State security services,
including in some cases causing death. See www.amnesty.org/en/countries/africa/democraticrepublic-of-the-congo/report-democratic-republic-of-the-congo/.
3