CEDH · CASELAW;JUDGMENTS;CHAMBER;ENG — 22 mars 2022

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AND OTHERS v. LITHUANIA (Application no. 55978/20)     JUDGMENT   Art 3 (procedural) • Expulsion (Tajikistan) • Refusal of asylum requests and intended removal of Tajik family without an adequate assessment of their claims as to the risks faced on their return given the first applicant’s ordinary membership in a banned opposition political party • Failure to examine claims as to existence in Tajikistan of a practice of ill-treatment of ordinary party members • Removal without a fresh assessment of applicants’ claims would entail a breach   STRASBOURG 22 March 2022 FINAL   22/06/2022   This judgment has become final under Article 44 § 2 of the Convention. It may be subject to editorial revision. In the case of T.K. and Others v. Lithuania, The European Court of Human Rights (Second Section), sitting as a Chamber composed of:   Jon Fridrik Kjølbro, President,   Carlo Ranzoni,   Egidijus Kūris,   Pauliine Koskelo,   Jovan Ilievski,   Gilberto Felici,   Diana Sârcu, judges, and Stanley Naismith, Section Registrar, Having regard to: the application (no.   55978/20) against the Republic of Lithuania lodged with the Court under Article 34 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (“the Convention”) by six Tajik nationals, Mr T.K. (“the first applicant”), Ms O.O. (“the second applicant”) and their four children (“the remaining applicants”), on 23   December 2020; the decision to give notice of the application to the Lithuanian Government (“the Government”); the decision not to have the applicants’ names disclosed; the decision to give priority to the application (Rule 41 of the Rules of Court); the decision to indicate interim measure to the respondent Government under Rule   39 of the Rules of Court; the parties’ observations; Having deliberated in private on 22 February 2022, Delivers the following judgment, which was adopted on that date: INTRODUCTION 1.     The case concerns the decisions by the Lithuanian authorities to refuse requests for asylum lodged by the applicants and to remove them to Tajikistan. The applicants complained that their removal would put them at a risk of ill-treatment because of the first applicant’s membership in a banned opposition political party. THE FACTS 2.     The applicants’ details are set out in the appendix. They were represented before the Court by Ms I. Ivašauskaitė , a lawyer practising in Vilnius. 3.     The Government were represented by their Agent, Ms   K.   Bubnytė ‑ Širmenė. The first set of asylum proceedings 4.     The applicants arrived in Lithuania in January 2019 and applied for asylum. They submitted that they faced a risk of persecution in their country of origin because of the first applicant’s political activities – he was a member of the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan (hereinafter “the IRPT” or “the party”), an opposition political party that had been banned and declared a terrorist organisation in Tajikistan. Procedure before the Migration Department 5.     The first and second applicants were interviewed by an officer of the Migration Department under the Ministry of the Interior (hereinafter “the Migration Department”) in the Tajik language, through an interpreter. 6 .     The first applicant was interviewed on 25   April and 23 May 2019. He stated that he had joined the IRPT in 2007, and that during the period of 2012 ‑ 2014 he had been the chair of the party committee in his village. His duties had consisted of admitting new members and distributing the party newspaper, and he had received a monthly salary. However, there had been only one other party member in the village, and the applicant had not known him personally because the latter had been afraid to disclose his identity. In 2013 the authorities had intensified the pressure exerted against members of the IRPT, and many had left the party because of threats that they had received. Almost daily, police officers had ordered him to come to a school or a medical facility, where they had pressured him to leave the party; on many occasions they had also shown up at his workplace. In 2014 an acquaintance of the applicant, a police officer, had told him that if he did not leave the party the police might plant a gun on him and send him to prison. Soon after that he had decided to leave the village, and in 2014 he and his family had moved to Dushanbe. 7 .     The first applicant stated that, while living in Dushanbe, he had gone to a few party meetings but had not been particularly active. However, in 2015, at the request of the regional chairman, he had agreed to stand as a candidate in elections to the regional parliament. Soon after his candidacy had been announced, he and his relatives had started receiving calls from the regional mayor’s office, trying to persuade him to withdraw his candidacy. He had also heard that the Tajik security services, to which he referred to as “the KGB”, had been asking about him, and for several months he had stayed at home, in hiding. In September 2015 the IRPT had been declared a terrorist organisation, and the authorities had ordered all members to turn in their membership cards to the security services. The first applicant had submitted a resignation letter and had turned in his membership card to the village party chairman. He had also asked his wife, the second applicant, to go to their house in the village and burn all the documents related to his participation in the party’s activities. (The first applicant later stated that he had submitted the resignation letter only to protect himself and that the IRPT considered such forced resignations to be invalid – see paragraph   18 below). In January 2017 he had left Tajikistan for Russia, and the other applicants had joined him there some time later. 8 .     The first applicant further stated that, while living in Russia, he had not been in touch with any other party members and had not received any threats. However, he had read online that several members of the IRPT had been arrested in Russia and taken to Tajikistan. As a result, the applicants had changed their place of residence several times and had eventually decided to seek protection in Europe. In January 2019 they had gone to Belarus by bus, and from there they had taken another bus to the Lithuanian border, where they had lodged their asylum applications. The first applicant believed that, if they were returned to Tajikistan, he would be arrested and imprisoned because of his refusal to renounce the IRPT. 9 .     The second applicant was interviewed on 25 April and 28 June 2019. She asserted that she and her family had left Tajikistan because of her husband’s political activities. However, he had not told her much about his activities or the threats that he had received; therefore, she was unable to give many details. The second applicant also stated that she did not wish to return to Tajikistan because she and her family were Muslims, and the authorities harassed women who wore the hijab; she added that on many occasions she and her daughters had been told by various officials to take off their hijabs or had been refused service for wearing them. 10.     In April 2019 the Migration Department contacted the chairman of the IRPT, who was based in Austria, asking whether the first applicant had ever been a member of the party. The chairman replied that the first applicant had not been a member. 11 .     In June 2019 the Migration Department received another letter from the IRPT chairman, stating that the first applicant was indeed a member of the party. The letter explained that it was difficult for party leaders who were in exile to contact those who were still in Tajikistan and to obtain precise information about party members. However, the head of one regional branch had recently been released from prison and had confirmed that the first applicant had indeed been a member since 2007. 12 .     The applicants provided to the Migration Department statements from several individuals attesting that the first applicant was a member of the IRPT. They also submitted a photograph which allegedly showed him participating in a party meeting. It depicted two prominent members of the IRPT and many other men standing behind them in a meeting room – the applicants stated that the first applicant could be seen among them in the photograph. 13 .     In July 2019 the Migration Department adopted a decision refusing to grant the applicants asylum (refugee status or subsidiary protection). It accepted that the first applicant had probably joined the IRPT in 2007. However, it did not appear that he had been particularly active – although he had stated that he had attended several party meetings, he had not made any speeches during those meetings and had been unable to indicate what issues had been discussed at them; he did not know the procedure for electing the head of the party, the address of the party headquarters in Dushanbe, or the name of the party chairman in his region. Moreover, in 2015 he had terminated his membership of the IRPT (see paragraph 7 above), and according to an announcement posted on the official website of the Ministry of Interior of Tajikistan, those who voluntarily left the party and ceased their cooperation with it no longer risked criminal liability. 14 .     The Migration Department found that there had been multiple reported cases where active or high-ranking members of the IRPT had been arrested, tried in unfair criminal trials and sentenced to life imprisonment or other excessive punishments, and that their families had been subjected to interrogations, imprisonment, or other unjustified restrictions. However, the statements given by the first applicant describing the threats that he had allegedly received (see paragraphs 6-8 above) had not corresponded to the typical actions of the Tajik authorities against political opponents. In particular, the first applicant had never been summoned to a police station or been charged with any crimes or arrested; nor had an official search for him ever been announced. His fear of persecution had been based essentially on rumours and publicly available information, but not on his personal experience or threats received directly from officials. The Migration Department also asserted that the first applicant’s account had not been corroborated by the second applicant. Furthermore, it noted that, while living in their country of origin, the applicants had been able to work, their children had gone to school, and they all had obtained passports and left the country legally, without any obstacles, which demonstrated that the Tajik authorities had not been interested in their whereabouts. 15 .     Accordingly, the Migration Department concluded that the account given by the first applicant did not credibly demonstrate that the Tajik authorities had had any interest in him or had sought to arrest him; moreover, the available country-of-origin information did not give grounds to believe that an ordinary former member of the IRPT, who had not been active in the party and no longer participated in its activities, would be at risk of persecution. 16 .     Lastly, the Migration Department found that the second applicant’s fear that she would not be able to freely manifest her religion and to wear the hijab in her country of origin (see paragraph 9 above) was well-founded; however, such restrictions did not attain the requisite threshold of severity to amount to persecution or inhuman or degrading treatment. Court proceedings The Vilnius Regional Administrative Court 17 .     The applicants lodged an appeal against the decision of the Migration Department. They argued that it was not clear on what criteria the latter had relied when deciding that the first applicant had not been an active member of the IRPT. They emphasised the fact that he had been the chair of the village party committee, had stood as a party candidate in regional elections, and had been paid for his work for the party (see paragraphs 6 and 7 above). They argued that his active and prominent role was also demonstrated by his participation in an event involving the leaders of the IRPT (see paragraph   12 above). 18 .     The applicants further submitted that many members had left the IRPT in 2015 because they had come under pressure from the State authorities, but that the party leadership considered the forced withdrawals of membership to be null and void. Therefore, the first applicant continued to be a member of the IRPT, which had been declared a terrorist organisation in Tajikistan, and risked persecution and ill-treatment solely by virtue of his membership. 19 .     The applicants submitted that the Tajik authorities committed systematic violations of human rights and persecuted real or perceived political opponents and their families. According to publicly available information, even former and non-active members of the IRPT were persecuted, subjected to criminal prosecution and threatened with torture; to that effect, the applicants relied on various press articles and reports published by non-governmental organisations (see paragraph 20 below) – they complained that the Migration Department had not collected and had not assessed that information. They compared the situation of the first applicant to that of several other individuals who had been mentioned in news articles and had been members of the party, had stood as candidates in local elections, and had been forced to leave the party in 2015, but who had subsequently been detained or otherwise persecuted. 20 .     The applicants referred to the annual reports issued by Freedom House in 2017, 2018 and 2019, according to which former members of the IRPT continued to be harassed, and to the 2019 annual report of the National Committee for the Release of Political Hostages and Prisoners of Tajikistan, which listed multiple cases of persecution, abduction and torture of former members of the IRPT. They also referred to several news articles, including the following: Tajikistan’s banned Islamic party claims former members hit by “wave of arrests” (online article by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 11 June 2018) “The Islamic Renaissance Party (IRPT) says it halted its activities in Tajikistan nearly three years ago, when it was outlawed by the Supreme Court. What hasn’t stopped, the Islam-rooted party claims, is the government’s persecution of its followers. In a statement released on June 11, the IRPT accused Tajik authorities of targeting “the opposition and especially the IRPT members” with a “new wave of arrests and retaliation,” a claim swiftly rejected by Dushanbe. The IRPT statement said that more than 100 former party members have been detained since the beginning of 2017 – two of them, it added, died in custody “due to pressure and torture.” ... According to the statement, 27 of the detained were given prison sentences ranging from three to 25 years. Most were charged with affiliation with the outlawed Salafi movement or for having links to the IRPT, which was banned in 2015, the statement said. Among the 27 listed was Alijon Sharipov, a 32-year-old man with no party affiliation who in May was sentenced to nine-and-half years in prison for watching, liking, and sharing information about IRPT gatherings on social media. Sharipov was found guilty of “calling for extremism, calling for the overthrow of the government, and working for banned political parties.” Most of the more than 100 allegedly detained were released, the IRPT statement said, and five remain in custody in Dushanbe’s police detention center while their cases are being processed ...” “We Have Succeeded in Surviving”: An Interview With Exiled Tajik Islamic Party Leader Muhiddin Kabiri (online article by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 27   January 2019) “... [Question]: The IRPT was banned toward the end of 2015 and declared an extremist group in Tajikistan. You and some others were not in the country at that time, but thousands of IRPT supporters remain there. What can you say about their situation? Are you able to maintain communication with some of them? ... Kabiri: Immediately after the banning of the party, we issued a statement about halting our activities not only in Tajikistan but across the post-Soviet space. We stated that no one has the right to act in the name of our party in these countries until the next decision. That way, we helped thousands of our members and supporters who did not succeed in getting out to avoid investigations and pressure from the authorities. ... [The Tajik authorities] often detained people and, after receiving a certain sum of money, released them. And the more intractable or influential figures were thrown in prison on the basis of fictitious charges and forced to make statements against the party. Some of those who were investigated had stopped their political activities before the ban on the party. The most recent example is Naimjon Samiev, the former head of the party’s branch in the Sughd region, who left for Russia in 2014 and ceased his activities. In November 2018, they arrested him in Chechnya at the request of Tajik authorities and secretly, without a trial, brought him to Tajikistan. Many migrants who earlier cooperated with us in Russia were forced to sign a statement at the embassy in Moscow in 2015 that they were ceasing their activities for the party. But this did not save them, and just the other day several people were forced to post video statements in which they said they were not members of our party. This shows that the repressive mechanism is still working ...” 21 .     On 11 November 2019 the Vilnius Regional Administrative Court dismissed the applicants’ appeal and upheld the decision of the Migration Department. It found that the Migration Department had carried out a thorough assessment of the risks that the applicants might face in their country of origin, but that their assertions regarding the risk of persecution had been only hypothetical and not substantiated by any evidence. The Supreme Administrative Court 22 .     The applicants lodged an appeal against the decision of the Vilnius Regional Administrative Court. They contended that the first applicant had provided a consistent and detailed account of his participation in the activities of the IRPT, and that therefore, under the relevant law, his active role had to be considered as an established fact (see paragraph 45 below). Moreover, they argued that neither the Migration Department nor the first-instance court had clarified the criteria that had been used to assess whether the first applicant’s role in the party had been sufficiently active. In addition, they submitted that the Migration Department and the first-instance court had failed to properly assess the country-of-origin information, which showed that even former and non-active members of the IRPT were at risk of persecution (see paragraph   20 above). 23 .     The applicants provided to the Supreme Administrative Court a written statement by the office of the chairman of the IRPT, issued in January 2020, which reiterated that the first applicant was a party member. It also stated that Tajikistan’s human rights record had deteriorated dramatically over the previous three years, and that numerous international human rights organisations had expressed their concern over the actions of the Tajik government against the IRPT. The applicants asked the court to add the document to the case file as evidence, since they had not had a possibility to submit it earlier. 24 .     On 26 February 2020 the Supreme Administrative Court dismissed the applicants’ appeal and upheld the decision of the lower court in its entirety. It found that the new evidence submitted by the applicants (see paragraph   23 above) did not change that court’s conclusion because it had not been demonstrated that the first applicant had been an active member of the party or one of its leaders. The second set of asylum proceedings 25.     Following the decision of the Supreme Administrative Court, the applicants were ordered to leave Lithuania. However, they did not do so, and in May 2020 they lodged new asylum applications. Procedure before the Migration Department 26.     The first and second applicants were interviewed on 3 June 2020, in the Tajik language, through an interpreter. They were asked to indicate any new circumstances which had not been mentioned during the first set of asylum proceedings or which had occurred subsequently. 27 .     The first applicant stated that, in addition to his previously described activities with the party committee in his home village (see paragraph   6 above), he had campaigned on behalf of an opposition candidate in the presidential election of 2013 and had collected signatures in support of her in several villages. He and others involved in the campaign had been subject to surveillance by the police and the security services. That same year he had been summoned to the local “KGB office”, where he had been questioned about his political activities and pressured to leave the party – an incident which, he stated, he had forgotten to mention during the previous interviews. He also gave the names of several other party members who might be able to confirm his active role in the party. He further stated that, for reasons of security, he had not told anyone much about his political activities – not even his wife. 28 .     During the interview, on several occasions the first applicant stated that other opposition activists and his former colleagues in the party – including those who had left the party after receiving threats from the authorities – had been imprisoned and ill-treated. He believed that he would suffer the same fate if he were to be returned to Tajikistan because they had all been involved in similar activities. However, the interviewing officer told him that the Migration Department did not need information concerning other persons – only information concerning the applicant himself, because each situation was different. 29.     In addition, both the first and second applicants submitted that they might be at a higher risk of ill-treatment in Tajikistan because they had lived in Europe for some time. They stated that several opposition activists had been taken to Tajikistan from Russia, and that those who had left Tajikistan and had subsequently returned had been given long prison sentences. 30 .     In June 2020 the Migration Department refused to grant the applicants asylum. It held that they had not provided any significant new information that had not been known when their first asylum applications had been examined. It also deemed that the accounts that the applicants had given during the two sets of proceedings had been inconsistent and that they had been unable to explain the discrepancies – particularly that concerning the extent of the first applicant’s activities within the party and the circumstances surrounding his encounters with law-enforcement officials. Be that as it may, the fact that the applicants had allegedly remembered some new details did not warrant the Migration Department reaching a different conclusion than it had before (see paragraphs 13-15 above). Moreover, even though the first applicant had provided more detailed information regarding the persecution of other members of the IRPT, that information was publicly available and it did not concern him; therefore, it could not constitute grounds for granting the applicants asylum. 31 .     The Migration Department again stated that only active or high-ranking members of the IRPT were at risk of persecution in Tajikistan. It observed that the first applicant was not sought by the Tajik authorities – his name was not included in the list of wanted persons published on the websites of the Ministry of the Interior or the Financial Monitoring Department of the National Bank of Tajikistan, nor had the Tajik authorities requested, via Interpol, the initiation of an international search for the first applicant Therefore, in view of his limited participation in the IRPT’s activities, and in the absence of any demonstrable interest on the part of the authorities in his whereabouts, the Migration Department concluded that his fear of persecution could not be considered well-founded. 32 .     The Migration Department further noted that Tajik law did not provide any penalties in respect of Tajik nationals who left the country to live abroad. Although the Tajik government sought to extradite opposition activists or journalists living in other countries, that was motivated by their active and public criticism of the government, and not by the mere fact of them living abroad. Accordingly, the Migration Department considered that such a risk did not arise in the applicants’ case. Although it was likely that, upon their return, the applicants would be questioned by the authorities in order to find out “where they had been and with whom they had had contacts”, there were no grounds to believe that that in itself would amount to persecution or to a violation of their rights. 33.     The decision included an order to remove the applicants to Tajikistan. Court proceedings The Vilnius Regional Administrative Court 34 .     The applicants lodged an appeal against the decision of the Migration Department. They argued that the Migration Department had failed to properly assess the relevant country-of-origin information: under the law, it had to take into account, inter alia , information about persons who were in a similar situation to that of the first applicant (see paragraph 45 below), but during the first set of asylum proceedings the information provided by the applicants had been disregarded; therefore, they raised and cited that information again (see paragraph 20 above). The applicants submitted that the aforementioned international reports and press articles clearly demonstrated that the Tajik authorities persecuted anyone who had links to the IRPT, and that the first applicant therefore belonged to a systematically persecuted group. 35 .     On 6 October 2020 the Vilnius Regional Administrative Court dismissed the applicants’ appeal and upheld the decision of the Migration Department. It agreed with the latter’s conclusion that the applicants had not provided any information that might demonstrate that, since the first applicant had left the IRPT in 2015 (albeit, according to him, only “formally” – see paragraph 18 above), the Tajik authorities had been looking for him, had tried to arrest him, or had shown any interest in his whereabouts. Thus, there were no grounds to believe that the applicants would be persecuted should they be returned to Tajikistan. The court also stated that the country ‑ of-origin information on which the applicants had relied (see paragraph 34 above) had already been submitted during the first set of asylum proceedings, and in any event, it concerned the period of 2018-2019 and thus could not be considered to constitute up-to-date information about persons who were in a similar situation to the first applicant; as a result, the court refused to examine it. The Supreme Administrative Court 36.     The applicants lodged an appeal against the decision of the Vilnius Regional Administrative Court, arguing that the Migration Department and the first-instance court had failed to assess the available information properly and thoroughly. 37 .     On 16 December 2020 the Supreme Administrative Court dismissed the applicants’ appeal and upheld the decision of the lower court in its entirety. It held that the first applicant’s activities (see paragraphs 6 and 27 above) showed that he had been an ordinary member of the IRPT, and that he had not demonstrated that he had been an active or high-ranking member of the party. The court reiterated that the available country-of-origin information did not give grounds to believe that an ordinary member of the IRPT, who had not been very involved in its activities and who no longer participated in them at all, would be at risk of persecution by the Tajik authorities. Interim measure indicated by the Court 38 .     On 23 December 2020 the duty judge granted the applicants’ request for an interim measure under Rule 39 of the Rules of Court and indicated to the Lithuanian Government that they should not be removed to Tajikistan for the duration of the proceedings before the Court. RELEVANT LEGAL FRAMEWORK AND PRACTICE Domestic law Law on the Legal Status of Aliens 39.     Article 86 § 1 of the Law on the Legal Status of Aliens (hereinafter “the Aliens Act”) provides, inter alia , that refugee status must be granted to an individual who, owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his or her nationality and is unable or, owing to such fear, unwilling to avail himself or herself of the protection of that country. 40 .     Article 87 § 1 provides that subsidiary protection must be granted to an individual who is outside the country of his or her nationality and is unable to return to it owing to a well-founded fear of torture or inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment; the death penalty or execution; or a serious and individual threat to his or her life or person by reason of indiscriminate violence in situations of international or internal armed conflict. 41.     Article 130 § 1 provides that an alien cannot be removed to a country in which there is a risk to his or her life or liberty; or where he or she may be persecuted on the grounds of his or her race, religion, nationality, membership in a social group, or political beliefs; or from which he or she may be removed to another such country. Article 130 §   2 provides that an alien cannot be removed to a country in which he or she may be subjected to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. 42.     Article 83 § 1 states that an asylum application and any information submitted by an asylum seeker in support of his or her application must be assessed in cooperation with the asylum seeker. 43 .     Under Article 83 § 2, if during the assessment of an asylum application it is established that, despite the genuine efforts of the asylum seeker, the veracity of information relevant for the determination of his or her status cannot be proved by written evidence, such information must be interpreted to the benefit of the asylum seeker and the asylum application must be considered well-founded, if all the following conditions are met: (1)   the asylum application was lodged as soon as possible, unless the asylum seeker provided a good reason why that had not been done; (2)   the asylum seeker submitted all the information at his or her disposal and provided a good explanation for why other important information had not been submitted; and (3)   the statements given by the asylum seeker are consistent and do not contradict the available general and specific information related to the case. 44.     Under Article 83 § 5, the benefit of the doubt provided in Article   83   §   2 (see paragraph 43 above) will not be applied if the asylum seeker misleads the authorities or attempts to protract the asylum procedure by his or her actions or inactivity, or tries to cheat ( sukčiauti ), or if contradictions are established in his or her account and those contradictions have a decisive impact on the granting of asylum. Order on Granting and Withdrawing Asylum 45 .     The Order on Granting and Withdrawing Asylum in the Republic of Lithuania was issued by the Minister of Interior on 24 February 2016 and was subsequently amended several times. At the material time, its relevant parts provided: “99.     An official of the Migration Department, when examining the merits of an asylum application, must: 99.1.     conduct an interview with the asylum seeker, the goal of which is to give the latter an opportunity to provide a detailed account of the grounds on which the asylum application is based, and to allow the interviewing officer to collect the information that is necessary in order to assess whether the asylum seeker meets the criteria provided in Article 86 § 1 or Article 87 § 1 of the Aliens Act ... ... During the interview the asylum seeker is firstly given an opportunity to freely present the grounds on which the asylum application is based, providing as much detail as possible. In order to determine the reasons for the asylum seeker leaving his or her country of origin and being afraid to return to it, the interviewing officer must ask additional and clarifying questions, including questions related to the asylum seeker’s life story and living conditions in the country of origin, the itinerary of his or her journey from the country of origin to Lithuania, and any previous persecution, violence or other threats to which the asylum seeker fears he may be subjected if returned to the country of origin. The asylum seeker must be given an opportunity to provide explanations regarding any missing information and (or) discrepancies or contradictions in his or her account. ... 115.     ... An officer of the Migration Department ... shall assess each case individually, objectively and impartially, taking account of: 115.1.     accurate and up-to-date information about the asylum seeker’s country of origin, including its laws and other legal instruments and the manner in which they are applied; 115.2.     the statements made and the documents provided by the asylum seeker ... ; 115.3.     the individual situation and the personal circumstances of the asylum seeker, including such factors as his or her, or his or her relatives’, biographical details, sex and age, as well as the treatment, in the country of origin, of persons who are in a similar situation to the asylum seeker, in order to assess, in the light of the asylum seeker’s personal circumstances, whether the actions that have been taken, or may have been taken, against him or her may be deemed to constitute persecution ... ... 116.     When carrying out the assessment in line with point 115, an officer of the Migration Department must follow, inter alia , the criteria provided in Article 83 of the Aliens Act ... When assessing the credibility of the information provided by an asylum seeker, an officer of the Migration Department must follow the principle of the balance of probabilities – that is to say [the officer should] assess whether each important circumstance which is indicated by the asylum seeker, but which is not supported by written evidence, is more likely than unlikely. All the statements made by the asylum seeker are to be assessed rationally, comprehensively and objectively ... ; declaring them to be unreliable cannot be based on subjective assumptions or intuition. If all or some of the assertions made by the asylum seeker are refuted or found to be unreliable, they are dismissed and not assessed any further. Statements that are supported by written evidence are considered to be established facts. If the asylum seeker’s account is essentially consistent and credible, the benefit of the doubt is applied – that is to say any doubts regarding statements made by [the asylum seeker] that have not been dismissed must be interpreted in the asylum seeker’s favour. Relying on the established facts and other information collected in respect of the case, an officer of the Migration Department must determine whether: 116.1.     the asylum seeker has a well-founded fear of being persecuted in his or her country of origin on the grounds of race, religion, nationality, or membership of a particular social group or political opinion. This assessment must follow the principle of reasonable probability – that is to say the threat does not have to be certain or more likely than unlikely, but it cannot be merely hypothetical or theoretical, or based on a slight or unlikely possibility ...” UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) 46 .     The UNHCR Note on Burden and Standard of Proof in Refugee Claims, issued in 1998, provides, in its relevant parts: “... IV. Standard of Proof in Establishing the Well-Foundedness of the Fear of Persecution ... Threshold 16.     The Handbook states that an applicant’s fear of persecution should be considered well-founded if he “can establish, to a reasonable degree, that his continued stay in his country of origin has become intolerable ...”. 17.     A substantial body of jurisprudence has developed in common law countries on what standard of proof is to be applied in asylum claims to establish well-foundedness. This jurisprudence largely supports the view that there is no requirement to prove well ‑ foundedness conclusively beyond doubt, or even that persecution is more probable than not. To establish “well-foundedness”, persecution must be proved to be reasonably possible ... Indicators for assessing well-foundedness of fear 18.     While by nature, an evaluation of risk of persecution is forward-looking and therefore inherently somewhat speculative, such an evaluation should be made based on factual considerations which take into account the personal circumstances of the applicant as well as the elements relating to the situation in the country of origin. 19.     The applicant’s personal circumstances would include his/her background, experiences, personality and any other personal factors which could expose him/her to persecution. In particular, whether the applicant has previously suffered persecution or other forms of mistreatment and the experiences of relatives and friends of the applicant as well as those persons in the same situation as the applicant are relevant factors to be taken into account. Relevant elements concerning the situation in the country of origin would include general social and political conditions, the country’s human rights situation and record; the country’s legislation; the persecuting agent’s policies or practices, in particular towards persons who are in similar situation as the applicant, etc. While past persecution or mistreatment would weigh heavily in favour of a positive assessment of risk of future persecution, its absence is not a decisive factor. By the same token, the fact of past persecution is not necessarily conclusive of the possibility of renewed persecution, particularly where there has been an important change in the conditions in the country of origin ...” RELEVANT COUNTRY INFORMATION UN Human Rights Committee 47 .     The UN Human Rights Committee deliberated on the third periodic report of Tajikistan at its 3,611th and 3,612th meetings, held on 2 and 3 July 2019. At its 3,635th meeting, held on 18 July 2019, it adopted the concluding observations, which provide, in the relevant part: “31.     While noting the measures taken to combat torture, including legislative reforms such as the amendments to the Code of Criminal Procedure in 2016 and the increase in the penalty for torture, the Committee remains concerned about: (a) continued reports of torture or ill-treatment of persons deprived of their liberty, particularly for the purposes of extracting confessions, including against human rights defenders and political opponents, such as in the cases of members of the banned Islamic Renaissance Party Mahmadali Hayit and Rahmatullo Rajab, and of Zayd Saidov; (b) admission of evidence obtained under torture by domestic courts, despite such evidence being inadmissible in law; (c) the absence of an independent mechanism to investigate all allegations of torture or ill-treatment and the low number of investigations and prosecutions ... ... 53.     The Committee notes with concern that the ban on religious and ethnicity-based political parties, introduced by the constitutional amendments of 2016, raises issues of compatibility with the [International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights]. It remains concerned ... about politically motivated harassment of opposition members that undermines genuine political pluralism and notably about: (a) the harassment and lengthy prison sentences handed down in respect of the leaders of the Islamic Renaissance Party after unfair and closed trials ... and the imprisonment of party members following the designation of the party in 2015 as “terrorist” for their alleged involvement in the attempted violent seizure of [power]; ... and (c)   serious harassment, and often imprisonment, of family members of opposition groups or of individuals associated with such groups ...” Human Rights Watch 48 .     In its 2016 annual World Report, Human Rights Watch reported on the banning of the IRPT and the actions taken by the Tajik authorities against its members: “Tajikistan’s already poor rights record dramatically worsened in 2015, as authorities declared the country’s leading opposition party a terrorist organization and banned it, imprisoned approximately 200 opposition activists, extradited and kidnapped government critics abroad, arrested several lawyers and at least one journalist, and harassed workers at nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) with onerous checks. ... In the run-up to Tajikistan’s parliamentary elections, the government sought to suppress the activities of the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan (IRPT), the country’s leading opposition party. In March, for the first time in Tajikistan’s modern history, the party was unable to win any seats in parliamentary elections. Monitors from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe said the vote was marred by ballot-stuffing and government intimidation. In June, IRPT’s leader, Muhiddin Kabiri, went into exile, fearing prosecution on bogus charges. That same month, 20 videos appeared online of IRPT members saying they were “voluntarily” abandoning the party. Mahmadali Hayit, the IRPT deputy head, said members