CCPR/C/122/D/2364/2014
1.1
The authors of the communication are Sarita Devi Sharma, her husband Bijaya
Sharma Paudel and their eldest son, Basanta Sharma Paudel, three Nepalese nationals born
on 24 February 1979, 14 June 1968 and 30 October 1995, respectively. They claim that the
State party has violated their rights under articles 6, 7, 9 (1–4), 10 (1) and 16 of the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, read alone and in conjunction with
article 2 (3) of the Covenant, regarding Ms. Sharma; under articles 7, 17 and 23 (1), read
alone and in conjunction with article 2 (3), regarding Bijaya Sharma Paudel; and articles 7,
17, 23 (1) and 24 (1), read alone and in conjunction with article 2 (3) of the Covenant, with
regard to Basanta Sharma Paudel. The authors are represented by counsel.
1.2
On 18 June 2014, the Committee, acting through its Special Rapporteur on new
communications and interim measures, decided to examine the admissibility of the
communication together with the merits, in accordance with rule 97 of the Committee’s
rules of procedure.
The facts as submitted by the authors
2.1
In February 1996, the Maoist Communist Party of Nepal launched an armed
rebellion against the Government that rapidly spread throughout the country, producing a
decade-long armed conflict. The Government declared a state of emergency on 26
November 2001 and issued the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention and
Punishment) Act, which suspended a number of dirigible rights enshrined in the Covenant,1
in accordance with its article 4, and granted a broad range of powers to the Royal Nepal
Army to arrest individuals on the basis of suspicion of involvement in terrorist activities
and to keep them in detention for up to 90 days without charge. Serious human rights
violations, such as arbitrary detentions, enforced disappearances, torture and extrajudicial
killings, were documented during that period by different United Nations and nongovernmental sources, even after the state of emergency was lifted on 20 August 2002.
2.2
According to the Human Rights Council Working Group on Enforced and
Involuntary Disappearances, in 2003 and 2004, Nepal had the largest number of reported
cases of enforced disappearance.2 In its report on its 2004 mission to Nepal, the Working
Group referred to the use of enforced disappearances as a widespread phenomenon with
perpetrators shielded by political and legal impunity.3 Between 2003 and 2006, the Army
barracks of the Bhairabnath Battalion, located in Maharajguni, Kathmandu, became the
main location for the illegal detention of those suspected of affiliation with the Maoist
Communist Party of Nepal in the capital and where they were forcibly disappeared, tortured
or summarily killed.4
2.3
Ms. Sharma is the sister of Himal Sharma, Secretary-General of the Maoist-affiliated
political party called “All Nepal National Independent Student Union Revolutionary”. The
authors submit that, on 20 October 2003, she and a friend, Ms. B.M., were followed by
members of the security forces dressed as civilians. She was questioned about her kinship
with Mr. Sharma and was threatened with guns. The two women were handcuffed,
blindfolded and dragged into a van, then taken to the Army barracks in Maharajgunj. They
were deprived of any legal safeguards during the entire period of their deprivation of
liberty. Ms. Sharma begged her captors to allow her to contact her two children, as her
husband was outside Kathmandu. She was finally able to make a telephone call to her sons’
1
2
3
4
2
The right to freedom of opinion and expression, the right to assembly, the right to movement, press
and publication rights, the right not to be subjected to preventive detention, the right to information,
the right to property, the right to privacy and the right to constitutional remedies.
See Human Rights Watch and Advocacy Forum, Waiting for Justice: Unpunished Crimes from
Nepal’s Armed Conflict (New York, 2008), p. 11. See also A/HRC/7/2, p. 115.
See E/CN.4/2005/65/Add.1, paras. 7–9, 25 and 27. See also
www.amnesty.org/download/Documents/136000/asa310032000en.pdf.
The author refers to the report of investigation of the Office of the United Nations High
Commissioner for Human Rights-Nepal into arbitrary detention, torture and disappearances at
Maharajgunj RNA barracks, Kathmandu in 2003-2004, available at
http://nepalconflictreport.ohchr.org/files/docs/2006-05-26_report_ohchr_eng.pdf.