JURIST - Paper Chase: Europe rights court urged to uphold absolute torture ban in deportation case

[JURIST] Amnesty International [advocacy website] Wednesday called for the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) [official website] to dismiss a UK request for a reconsideration of the absolute ban on torture and coercion in ECHR case law. The court is currently holding hearings [press release] in the case of Saadi v. Italy, where Nassim Saadi, a Tunisian national lawfully residing in Italy [JURIST news archive], was ordered deported to Tunisia [JURIST news archive] while appealing an Italian conviction on charges of criminal conspiracy and forgery. Saadi says his return to Tunisia would result in torture and mistreatment, violations of the European Convention on Human Rights [text]. The UK and several other nations have intervened in the case, arguing that the prohibition on torture and ill-treatment should not prevent a country from deporting a foreign national whom a state considers a threat to national security.

Amnesty says the prohibition of torture and mistreatment "is absolute for good reason," calling it "fundamental, peremptory, and intransgressible." Amnesty also dismissed an Italian "diplomatic assurance" with Tunisia that Saadi would not be harmed as unenforceable. Amnesty International has more.

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