Opinion ID: 787211
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Berishaj's Application for Protection Under the CAT

Text: 71 An applicant for relief under the CAT must show that it is more likely than not that he would be tortured in the country of removal. See Wang v. Ashcroft, 368 F.3d 347, 348 (3d Cir.2004) (quoting 8 C.F.R. § 1208.16(c)(2) (2004)); see also Dia, 353 F.3d at 233 n. 1. It is the alien's burden to show this, and objective evidence is required. See Sevoian, 290 F.3d at 175. The government simply argues that Berishaj's CAT claim fails because the IJ found him not credible, and it was only his own testimony that formed the basis for the objective likelihood of being tortured. Berishaj counters that the IJ's analysis of the CAT claim is so cursory that it is impossible to tell whether (1) the IJ thought that a CAT claim could not stand if the asylum claim fell, or (2) the IJ analyzed the country conditions evidence and concluded that it did not support a CAT claim. The first alternative would be a legal error, and would be grounds for granting the petition because asylum and CAT claims are analytically separate. See Zubeda v. Ashcroft, 333 F.3d 463, 476 (3d Cir.2003) (quoting Kamalthas v. INS, 251 F.3d 1279, 1283 (9th Cir.2001)). 72 We think the better reading of the IJ's decision to be the second alternative-that the record as a whole does not show that Berishaj is more likely to be tortured than not if removed to Montenegro. Preliminarily, we note that Berishaj's own testimony-whether credible or not-has nothing to do with his CAT claim; CAT claims are entirely concerned with the objective likelihood of torture in the future, and Berishaj's testimony did not address contemporary treatment of disfavored persons in Montenegro in any particularized way. 73 The balance of the record describes mistreatment and indignities, but there is scant evidence-let alone compelling evidence-that it is more likely than not that Berishaj would be tortured if removed to Montenegro. To be sure, the record suggests that, at the time of its making, there was political instability in the fledgling Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (many newspaper articles in the record attest to this), and that Serbs continued to perpetrate abuses and massacres in Kosovo (this is well-chronicled in the 1999 Country Report). But the former does not, of course, amount to torture, and the latter was in Kosovo, not Montenegro. As for Montenegro itself, there are reports of extrajudicial killings perpetrated by the Yugoslav army, but such action seemed to be outside of government control or direction, and at all events, was not more likely than not to be the fate of a Montenegrin like Berishaj. There was also forcible conscription of ethnic Albanians in Montenegro, but again, this is not torture. Most troubling perhaps is that a human rights group, the International Crisis Group, claims that as of 1999, Yugoslav forces ha [ve] undertaken limited ethnic cleansing campaigns directed against ethnic Albanians in northern Montenegro. Similar reports are scattered throughout the administrative record. 74 Ultimately, even if this activity amounts to torture in some instances, there is no suggestion that it is nearly frequent enough to compel the conclusion that Berishaj himself would more likely than not suffer torture upon removal to Montenegro. Thus we must deny the petition for review of Berishaj's CAT claim. We also note that our observations regarding stale administrative records, see supra Part III.B, can apply with similar force to claims for protection under the CAT, even though in this particular case the CAT issue is not presented in as stark a relief as the asylum issue.