CCPR/C/117/D/2493/2014
6 August 2014. The Board found the author’s claims and story unconvincing and lacking in
credibility. The author submits that he has exhausted all available domestic remedies.
The complaint
3.
The author claims that his deportation to Somalia would violate his rights under
articles 7 and 9 of the Covenant as he is at risk of being tortured or killed in Somalia. He
claims that citizens who refuse to join Al-Shabaab are at high risk of being killed. In
addition, he would always be persecuted and subjected to human rights abuses and
discrimination in Somalia because his minority clan is “suppressed”. He was falsely
accused of a theft and was imprisoned because he belongs to the minority Ashraf clan. He
also considers that the Refugee Appeals Board did not examine the possible psychological
and physical effects on him as a result of the murder of his father and his brother, his
imprisonment and the severe situation in Somalia. The Board made no investigation to
clarify the extent of the dangerous conditions in Somalia.
State party’s observations on admissibility and the merits
4.1
On 9 June 2015, the State party submitted that the present communication was
inadmissible and without merit. The State party recalls the facts of the case and refers to the
decision of the Refugee Appeals Board of 6 August 2014. It notes that the Board
considered that the author had made vague statements about Al-Shabaab’s approaches,
including about his attempted escape after he had been approached for the fourth time, and
considered that the information he gave on that matter appeared to be “fabricated for the
occasion”. Furthermore, the Board noted that his father’s conflicts with the Habar Gidir
clan dated back a long time, but that the author himself had had no conflicts with that clan.
Nor had he had any other problems due to his clan affiliation. The Refugee Appeals Board
also concluded that the author, who appeared to be a very low-profile individual, was
unable to substantiate his grounds for asylum before the Board. Therefore, the Board
rejected his statement that he had allegedly been pursued by Al-Shabaab. According to the
most recent background information on Qoryooley, the Board considered it a fact that
Al−Shabaab had been driven out from that town, and that regardless of the generally
difficult conditions in the area, it could not be assumed that the general security situation in
the area was of such a nature that everybody returning to Qoryooley may be deemed to be
at a real risk of abuse. Consequently, the Board found that the author did not establish that
he was persecuted at the time when he left Somalia, or that he would risk persecution
giving rise to protection under section 7 (1) of the Aliens Act, or that he would risk
treatment or punishment under section 7 (2) of that Act.
4.2
The State party then proceeded to provide a detailed description of its refugee status
application proceedings, the legal basis and the functioning of the Refugee Appeals Board. 1
As regards the general conditions in a country, the State party refers to the judgment of the
European Court of Human Rights in NA. v. the United Kingdom, in which it was stated that
the mere possibility of ill-treatment because of an unstable situation or a general situation
of violence in the applicant’s country of origin would not, in itself, amount to a breach of
article 3 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms
(European Convention on Human Rights).2 In that case, the Court assessed that a
deterioration in the security situation and an increase in human rights violations in a
specific country did not independently create a general risk to all persons of a specific
1
2
For a full description, see communication No. 2379/2014, Obah Hussein Ahmed v. Denmark, Views
adopted on 7 July 2016, paras. 4.1-4.4.
Application No. 25904/07, judgment of 17 July 2008, para. 114.
3