CCPR/C/130/D/2671/2015
High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on credibility assessment. 2 In support of his
claims, he also refers to the general situation of forced returnees in Afghanistan.3
3.2
Furthermore, the author claims a violation of his rights under article 13 of the
Covenant.4
State party’s observations on admissibility and the merits
4.1
In a note verbale dated 6 May 2016, the State party submitted its observations on
admissibility and the merits. It challenges the admissibility and the merits of the
communication and notes that it is for the author to establish a prima facie case for the
purposes of admissibility. The State party argues that the author’s claims under articles 6, 7
and 13 are manifestly ill-founded and should therefore be declared inadmissible for lack of
sufficient substantiation. Should the Committee declare the communication admissible, the
State party is of the view that articles 6 and 7 of the Covenant would not be violated if the
author were returned to Afghanistan. It further submits that article 13 of the Covenant had
not have been violated in connection with the hearing of the author’s asylum case by the
Danish authorities.
4.2
The State party describes the structure, composition and functioning of the Refugee
Appeals Board,5 and the legislation that applies to asylum proceedings.6
4.3
Regarding the alleged violation of articles 6 and 7 of the Covenant, the State party
submits that the Refugee Appeals Board did not question the author’s statements that he had
worked for the Ministry of Labour, Social Affairs, Martyrs and Disability and that he
belonged to a group of persons who may in general, owing to their work, be at risk of abuse
by the Taliban or other groups fighting against the Afghan authorities. At the same time, the
Board considered that those circumstances did not independently justify the granting of a
residence permit without substantiation of the claim that he would be at a specific and
individual risk of persecution upon his deportation to Afghanistan. In this context, the State
party notes that the domestic authorities could not accept as a fact that the author had come
into conflict with the Taliban, because the author’s narrative was found to lack credibility. In
its assessment, the Board took the view that the author’s statements about whether he had
been in touch with the police and whether the police had been willing to protect him seemed
incoherent and inconsistent. Furthermore, he had provided conflicting statements as to
whether he had continued to work outside of his office after having received the first
threatening call. The Board also considered it peculiar that, having received the second
written threat, the author had stayed at home for 14 more days before leaving Afghanistan.
In addition, he gave vague and evasive answers to essential questions, including as to whether
it had been the same person who had made the telephone calls, in spite of the fact that the
calls had lasted for approximately 10–15 minutes with no disruption to or problems with
connection. The State party notes in this respect that the author is a young man with a
university degree and that the alleged threats were made over a relatively short period of time
(from April to June 2015), which makes it unlikely that the author should have difficulty
appropriately remembering the events. Nevertheless, the author failed to provide any
reasonable explanation for these inconsistencies, apart from arguing that there had been some
problems with interpretation, which, however, was not accepted by the authorities as he had
raised these concerns only at a late stage in the proceedings.
4.4
In addition, the State party submits that the domestic authorities could not accept any
of the written threats submitted by the author as evidence because they were found to have
2
3
4
5
6
UNHCR, UNHCR Eligibility Guidelines for Assessing the International Protection Needs of Asylum
Seekers from Afghanistan, 6 August 2013 (document HCR/EG/AFG/13/01).
The author refers to notes verbales from the Embassy of Afghanistan in Norway dated 26 February
2015 and 2 March 2015 calling for a halt to all forcible deportations to Afghanistan.
The author does not put forward any further arguments. The alleged problems of interpretation have
been raised only in connection with his new submission to the domestic authorities, but no
explanation has been provided as to whether and how he considers these alleged problems to have
constituted a violation of his rights under the Covenant.
Hussein Ahmed v. Denmark (CCPR/C/117/D/2379/2014), paras. 4.1–4.3.
See sections 7 and 31 of the Aliens Act.
3