CEDH · CASELAW;DECISIONS;DECCOMMISSION;ENG — 12 juillet 1971

.sDD6737AE { font-size:11pt } .s211D6B00 { margin-top:0pt; margin-bottom:0pt; line-height:normal; widows:0; orphans:0; font-size:8.5pt } .sBB9EE52A { font-family:Arial }  THE FACTS   The facts of the case as submitted by the applicant may be summarised as follows:   The applicant is a citizen of Syria, born on .. April 1943. Since ... 1966 he had been resident in Vienna.   On .. July 1969, the Regional Criminal Court (Landesgericht für Strafsachen) in Vienna sentenced him to four months' severe imprisonment (schwerer Kerker) for attempting larceny. At the same time, the Court ordered the applicant's deportation to Syria, and revoked the suspension of a previous sentence to fourteen days' detention. Furthermore, the applicant had been charged with seventeen different traffic offenses.   After having served his sentence, the applicant remained in custody with a view to his forthcoming deportation. It was then that he addressed himself to the Commission, alleging that in Syria he had been condemned by default to eleven years' imprisonment for political reasons and that, therefore, deportation to his home country would have serious consequences for him.   After his first and only letter of 9 February 1970, by which he lodged his complaint, the applicant has not manifested himself again and he failed, in particular, to reply to the letter of 19 February 1970 by which the Commission's Secretary requested him to submit further particulars about his case and to specify in what way he considered the Convention had been violated.   THE LAW   The applicant claims to be a political opponent of the regime in his country. He has submitted that deportation to Syria, as ordered by the Regional Criminal Court in Vienna, would have serious consequences for him, particularly since he had been condemned by default by a Syrian Court for a crime alleged by him to be of a political nature.   The Commission, in accordance with its established jurisprudence (see applications Nos. 4162/69, Collection of Decisions, Vol. 32, p. 87; No. 4436/70, Collection of Decisions, Vol. 35, p. 69), has observed that although the right to be protected from extradition is not as such covered by the Convention, the possible consequences to an applicant of such extradition might in particular circumstances raise the question of a violation of Article 3 (Art. 3) of the Convention for which the extraditing country might be held responsible.   However, under Article 26 (Art. 26) of the Convention, the Commission may only deal with a matter after all domestic remedies have been exhausted according to the generally recognised rules of international law.   While in the present case the applicant has expressly complained to the Commission of the deportation order on the ground that he was a political refugee, he has not shown that he has made any attempt to be granted the status of a political refugee under the appropriate provisions available to him in Austria, particularly under the terms of the Federal Act of 7 March 1968 on Refugee Residence Permits (Bundesgesetz über die Aufenthaltsberechtigung der Flüchtlinge). He can therefore not be considered to have exhausted the remedies available to him under Austrian law. Moreover, an examination of the case, as it has been submitted, including an examination made ex officio, does not disclose the existence of any special circumstances which might have absolved the applicant, according to the generally recognised rules of international law, from exhausting the domestic remedies at his disposal.   It follows that the applicant has not complied with the condition as to the exhaustion of domestic remedies and his application must in this respect be rejected under Article 27 (3) (Art. 27-3) of the Convention.   For these reasons, the Commission DECLARES THIS APPLICATION INADMISSIBLE