Type: Interim measures

Authority: European Authorities: European Court of human rights

Date: 11/17/2008

Subject: Between 11 and 14 November 2008 the European Court of Human Rights received eleven applications lodged by Afghan nationals placed in administrative detention pending their removal to their country of origin on a flight organised by the French and British authorities. The applicants complain essentially, under Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (prohibition of torture and inhuman or degrading treatment) that if they were removed to Afghanistan they would face a real risk of torture or ill-treatment by the Taliban. They also allege a violation of Article 4 of Protocol No. 4 to the Convention (prohibition of collective expulsion of aliens). The applicants requested the Court to apply Rule 39 of the Rules of Court and to invite the French authorities to suspend their removal to Afghanistan pending consideration of their applications by the Court. On 14 November 2008 the Court informed the French Government, under Rule 40 of the Rules of Court, of the lodging of the applications. On 17 November 2008 the President of the Chamber to which the cases had been allocated decided, in the interests of the parties and of the proper conduct of the proceedings before the Court, to indicate to the French Government under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court that the applicants should not be removed to Afghanistan. In 2005, the Court applied Rule 39 in another case brought by an Afghan national (see Sultani v. France, no. 45223/05, judgment of 20 September 2007).

Classification: Dignity - Art. 4 Inhuman treatments - Degrading treatments - Freedoms - Art. 19 Prohibition of collective expulsions