CAT/C/71/D/900/2018
United Nations
Convention against Torture
and Other Cruel, Inhuman
or Degrading Treatment
or Punishment
Distr.: General
29 September 2021
English
Original: French
Committee against Torture
Decision adopted by the Committee under article 22 of the
Convention, concerning communication No. 900/2018*, **
Communication submitted by:
X (represented by counsel, Gian Luigi Berardi)
Alleged victim:
The complainant
State party:
Switzerland
Date of complaint:
4 December 2018 (initial submission)
Document references:
Decision taken pursuant to rules 114 and 115 of
the Committee’s rules of procedure, transmitted
to the State party on 11 December 2018 (not
issued in document form)
Date of adoption of decision:
22 July 2021
Subject matter:
Expulsion to Eritrea
Procedural issues:
None
Substantive issues:
Risk to life and risk of torture or ill-treatment in
the event of expulsion to country of origin
Articles of the Convention:
1, 3 and 16
1.1
The complainant is X, a national of Eritrea who was born on 1 August 1998. His
application for asylum in Switzerland was rejected and he is now facing expulsion to Eritrea.
He considers that his expulsion would constitute a violation by the State party of articles 1,
3 and 16 of the Convention. The State party has made the declaration under article 22 (1) of
the Convention, effective 2 December 1986. The complainant is represented by counsel.
1.2
On 11 December 2018, pursuant to rule 114 of its rules of procedure, the Committee,
acting through its Rapporteur on new complaints and interim measures, requested the State
party to refrain from returning the complainant to Eritrea while his complaint was being
considered. On 20 December 2018, the State party informed the Committee that it had
suspended the complainant’s expulsion to Eritrea.
The facts as submitted by the complainant
2.1
The complainant, who belongs to the Saho ethnic group, was born in Wilisho, Eritrea,
near the Ethiopian border. He dropped out of school in 2015, when he was 16 and a half years
old, because the quality of the teaching was poor, and he then worked for two months as a
shepherd. During this period, soldiers stationed near his village came to his home twice in
* Adopted by the Committee at its seventy-first session (12–30 July 2021).
** The following members of the Committee participated in the examination of the communication:
Essadia Belmir, Claude Heller, Erdoğan İşcan, Liu Huawen, Ilvija Pūce, Diego Rodríguez-Pinzón,
Sébastien Touzé, Bakhtiyar Tuzmukhamedov and Peter Vedel Kessing.
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