CAT/C/52/D/402/2009
then Chief of Service in the office of the Political Commissioner, did not want to participate
in a mission, led by the counter-terrorism brigade, into villages in the Boumerdès region,
because he was aware that citizens were abused and massacred during those missions. In
order to avoid participating, he obtained a medical certificate. Nevertheless, by the time of
his return on 7 May 1994, a wanted-person notice had been issued for desertion, and the
complainant was placed in detention in the Reghaïa barracks. Though subsequently
released by the prosecutor of the Blida military court on presentation of a copy of his
medical certificate, he was given a suspended sentence of 3 months’ imprisonment for
desertion on 20 November 1994.
2.2
In May 1997, one night while on duty at the Reghaïa barracks, the complainant
refused to take part in a torture session, and he left the barracks the next day. On the advice
of an officer who was his friend, and who told him that matters had been taken care of, he
returned to the barracks two days later. After resuming his post, he received a telephone call
from his superior, a colonel, who told him that he was granting him leave. He then left the
barracks and went to stay with his family in Tébessa. Having returned from his leave on the
evening of 31 May, he was arrested the next day by military officers and detained in the
Blida military prison. He was prosecuted for disobedience, for writing newspaper articles
without authorization, and for desertion. Only the last of these charges was upheld by the
Blida military court, which sentenced him to 2 months’ imprisonment on 23 June 1997.
Since the suspension granted in 1994 had been revoked, the complainant spent 5 months in
detention and was not released until 31 October 1997. The complainant then resumed his
post as Chief of Service in the office of the Political Commissioner at the Reghaïa barracks.
2.3
In 1998, in the course of his duties, the complainant drafted a report requested by the
Ministry of Defence on, among other things, the recruitment of young Islamists in
Afghanistan, and in which he implicated the Minister for Small and Medium-Sized
Enterprises and future Chief of the MSP (Movement for a Society of Peace or HMS
(Harakat Mujtama` al-Silm)) Islamic Party, Bouguerra Soltani. As a result of this report,
the complainant was placed on “convalescent leave” for “administrative reasons” for three
times 29 days, and then on “indefinite leave”, until further notice. He was unable to obtain
an explanation from the personnel office of the Ministry. His pay was stopped in 1999, and
he learned that he was considered to be a deserter. During the period of “indefinite leave”,
the complainant wrote articles for various Algerian newspapers, under pseudonyms when
they were of a political nature.
The complainant’s third arrest
2.4
Since he could no longer work with the Army or write freely, and fearing for his
safety, the complainant decided to leave Algeria, and acquired false identity papers. On 12
April 2001, as he was attempting to leave the country by crossing the border between
Algeria and Tunisia, he was arrested by the border police at the Bouchebka border post. He
was then turned over to the police at the Tébessa wilaya (prefecture) where he was
questioned and then transferred to the Intelligence and Security Department (DRS) of the
Tébessa wilaya, where he was questioned again. The next day, the complainant was handed
over to the DRS eastern region services, and then taken in a car, hooded, handcuffed, and
unable to see the faces of his escort, from Tébessa to Constantine. On arrival, he was placed
in a cell alone.2 He was then subjected to acts of torture, including the “rag technique”
(forcing the victim to swallow a very large quantity of dirty water to the point of
suffocation), beatings, electric shocks to sensitive parts of his body, and suspension by his
2
GE.14-05037
The complainant does not name the place of detention where he was allegedly tortured, although it
can be deduced from his testimony that he was detained in the DRS centre in Constantine.
3