H.S., a national of Uganda, claims that the State party would violate her rights under article 3 of the Convention if it removed her to Uganda. H.S. first understood that she was a lesbian when she was 14 years old and has had sexual relationships with girls. H.S.’s family tried to hide homosexuality. Nonetheless, some local people found out about it. They spat and yelled at the complainant and told her to stay away from other girls. Later the complainant was raped by a man who repeatedly told her that a woman should be with a man. The complainant told her father about the incident, but he did not react. The complainant’s family expelled her from their home, and she has not been in contact with her family since then.
In June 2007, the complainant fled Uganda for Denmark with A. because she was not free to live as a homosexual in Uganda and feared being raped and imprisoned because of her sexual orientation. Upon her arrival in Denmark, the complainant did not apply for asylum because she did not know that she had to actively do something to be allowed to stay in Denmark.
She only became aware of her illegal situation in 2013, when the police found her and arrested her for staying illegally in Denmark. The complainant was placed in custody, where she applied for asylum and was interviewed by the Danish Centre against Human Trafficking, which recognized her as a victim of human trafficking. But the Danish Immigration Service concluded that the complainant was not a victim of human trafficking and rejected the complainant’s request for asylum. The complainant contacted LGBT Asylum, an organization that defends the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender asylum seekers, and became an active member. The Danish Refugee Appeals Board upheld the Danish Immigration Service’s rejection of the complainant’s request for asylum, finding that the complainant’s account of facts was not credible.
In 2014 the Danish Immigration Service recognized the complainant as a victim of human trafficking. The Danish Refugee Council requested the Refugee Appeals Board to reopen the complainant’s case as she had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and dissociative amnesia and she had been identified as a victim of human trafficking. In 2016 the Board reopened the case and accepted the complainant’s account of the facts but found that the risk of persecution was not sufficient to grant asylum and rejected the complainant’s request for asylum.
As a member of LGBT Asylum, the complainant has given a number of public statements and participated in pride parades and debates. She has also given anonymous interviews to the Danish media. In 2016, an article appeared in an online Ugandan gossip publication featuring the complainant’s name and photograph. The article portrayed her as “a top Ugandan lesbian” to be deported from Denmark. In 2017, the Refugee Appeals Board again rejected her request for asylum.
The UN Torture Committee considers that the complainant has not adequately demonstrated the existence of substantial grounds for believing that her return to Uganda would expose her to a real, foreseeable and personal risk of torture contrary to article 3 of the Convention. Therefore, the Committee concluded that the complainant’s removal to Uganda by the State party would not constitute a violation of article 3 of the Convention.