554
20.10.2005
Press release issued by the Registrar
APPLICATION LODGED WITH THE COURT RAMZY v. THE NETHERLANDS
A case concerning the removal to Algeria of a person suspected of
involvement in an Islamic extremist group in the Netherlands has been lodged with the European
Court of Human Rights.
The applicant in the case Ramzy v. the Netherlands (application no
25424/05) complains under Article 3 (prohibition of torture or inhuman or
degrading treatment) of the European Convention on Human Rights that, if
removed to Algeria, he will be exposed to a real risk of torture or
ill-treatment at the hands of the Algerian authorities.
On 15 July
2005 the Acting President of the
Section of the Court dealing with the case decided to indicate to the Netherlands
Government – under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court – that the applicant should
not be removed to Algeria while the case was before the
European Court. The Acting President also decided
to ask the Netherlands Government to submit their observations on the
admissibility and merits of the case.
Leave to intervene as a third
party in the Court’s proceedings has also been granted to: the Governments of Italy,
Lithuania, Portugal, Slovakia and the United Kingdom and the non-governmental
organisations the AIRE Centre, Interights (also on
behalf of Amnesty International Ltd, the Association for the Prevention of
Torture, Human Rights Watch, The International Commission of Jurists, Open
Society Justice Initiative and Redress), Justice and Liberty.
The applicant claims to be Mohammed Ramzy, an Algerian national who was born in 1982. He
resides in the Netherlands, where he is known to the authorities under that name and ten other
names. He was
arrested in the Netherlands on 12 June 2002 on suspicion of involvement in an
Islamic extremist network active in the Netherlands, linked to the Algerian Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat (Groupe Salafiste pour la
Prédication et le Combat; “GSPC”). The network’s main
activities are considered to be: aiding and abetting people who have actively
participated in the holy war (“jihad”), forgery of identity papers, the
recruitment and preparation of young men in the Netherlands for active participation in the holy
war, and drugs trafficking for the purposes of financing its activities. The
suspicions concerning the applicant were based on official reports drawn up on
22 and 24 April 2002 by the Netherlands intelligence and security
authorities.
The applicant was
subsequently formally charged and summoned to appear before Rotterdam Regional Court to stand trial. On 5
June 2003,
following trial proceedings, which attracted considerable media attention, the
court acquitted the applicant of all charges and ordered his release from
pre-trial detention. It held that the reports relied on by the prosecution
could not be used in evidence. As the intelligence officials had refused to
give evidence about the origins of the information set out in the intelligence
reports, relying on their statutory obligation to observe secrecy, and as the
competent Ministers had not released them from that obligation, the defence had
not been given the opportunity to verify in an effective manner the origins and
accuracy of the information in the reports. The prosecution initially filed an
appeal against that judgment, but withdrew it on 6
September 2005, before the trial proceedings on appeal had started.
Immediately after his release on 5
June 2003,
the applicant was apprehended by the aliens’ police and placed in aliens’ detention
for expulsion purposes. On the same day, he applied for asylum, claiming that
he risked being subjected to torture and/or ill-treatment in Algeria. His asylum request was eventually
rejected in a final decision taken by the Administrative Jurisdiction Division
of the Council of State on 6 July 2005.
On 21 July 2003, under Article 59 § 4 of the Netherlands
2000 Aliens Act, the applicant was released from aliens’ detention, as no
decision had been taken by the Minister for Immigration and Integration on his
asylum request within 42 days. On 15 July 2004, he was again placed in aliens’ detention in the Netherlands pending his expulsion.
On 14 September 2004, the Minister for Immigration and
Integration had issued an exclusion order against the applicant. The Minister
held that the applicant was posing a threat to national security and that the
issuance of this exclusion order was in the interests of the Netherlands international relations. On 31
August 2005,
the Minister rejected the applicant’s objection to the decision. The applicant’s
appeal against the decision of 31 August 2005 is currently pending before the
Regional Court of The Hague.
On
15 September
2005, he was released from aliens’
detention, under a ruling that day from the Regional Court of The Hague, who found the
applicant’s continued placement in aliens’ detention to be unlawful, in that
there were no prospects for his removal from the Netherlands within a reasonable time.
***
Further information about the Court can be
found on its Internet site (http://www.echr.coe.int).
Registry of the European Court of Human Rights
F – 67075 Strasbourg Cedex
Press contacts: Roderick
Liddell (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 88 41 24 92)
Emma
Hellyer (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 90 21 42 15)
Stéphanie Klein (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 88 41 21 54)
Beverley
Jacobs (telephone: +00 33 (0)3 90 21 54 21)
Fax: +00 33 (0)3 88 41 27 91
The European Court of Human Rights was set up in Strasbourg by the Council of Europe Member States in 1959 to deal with alleged
violations of the 1950 European Convention on Human Rights. Since 1 November 1998 it has sat as a full-time Court composed of an equal number of judges
to that of the States party to the Convention. The Court examines the admissibility
and merits of applications submitted to it. It sits in Chambers of 7 judges or,
in exceptional cases, as a Grand Chamber of 17 judges. The Committee of
Ministers of the Council of Europe supervises the execution of the Court’s judgments.