CCPR/C/123/D/2747/2016 State party’s observations on admissibility 4.1 On 17 May 2016 the State party submitted its observations on admissibility and requested the Committee to reject the communication as inadmissible. 4.2 The State party notes that the author was on two occasions found guilty of wearing a garment to conceal her face in public, specifically a niqab. On the two occasions, she was sentenced by the community court in Nantes to pay fines of 140 and 150 euros on 21 November 2011 and 26 March 2012, respectively. The author was indeed sentenced to pay a fine of 140 euros on 21 November 2011 for wearing a garment to conceal her face in public, an infraction under Act No. 2010-1192. The offence was noted during a traffic check. On 26 March 2012, the community court judge once again sentenced the author to pay a fine of 150 euros for the same offence after she refused to remove her full face veil at the security checkpoint for entry into the court that was due to rule on her first offence. The author did not appear at either of the two hearings. 4.3 The author filed two applications for review before the criminal chamber of the Court of Cassation to challenge these rulings. It was only before the Court of Cassation that she argued that Act No. 2010-1192, the legal basis for the convictions in question, was contrary to articles 9 and 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights. 4.4 The State party submits that the Committee has already indicated that the condition requiring the exhaustion of domestic remedies has not been met, as it was in cassation that the author for the first time put forward the claim invoked before the Committee. Those grounds were declared inadmissible by the highest domestic court because they had not been invoked before the ordinary court.12 4.5 The author’s application before the European Court of Human Rights related to the same facts as those presented before the Committee and on 11 September 2014 the author was informed that her application was inadmissible under articles 34 and 35 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The State party recalls the reservation that it entered upon ratification of the Optional Protocol, relating to article 5 (2) (a). It recalls the Committee’s practice according to which a matter cannot be considered as being “examined” by another international body if the case has been dismissed on purely procedural grounds. Conversely, a decision of inadmissibility based on even limited consideration of the merits of a case constitutes an examination within the meaning of article 5 (2) (a). 4.6 In the present case, the decision of the European Court of Human Rights addressed to Ms. Yaker declaring her application inadmissible does not cite the grounds for inadmissibility. However, articles 34 and 35 of the European Convention on Human Rights set out six grounds for inadmissibility: (a) if the six-month period for the submission of the application is exceeded, as counted from the date on which the final domestic decision is taken; (b) if the complaint is anonymous; (c) if the matter is already being examined under another procedure of international investigation or settlement; (d) if domestic remedies have not been exhausted; (e) if the application is manifestly ill-founded or an abuse; and (f) if the applicant has not suffered a significant disadvantage. 4.7 In the light of the fact that the application was submitted within six months, exclusively and not anonymously to the European Court of Human Rights, and also that the alleged disadvantage was significant according to the meaning outlined in article 35 of the Convention, the State party considers that it follows implicitly, but also necessarily, that the application could be denied by the European Court only for a failure to exhaust domestic remedies or because it was considered to be manifestly ill-founded or an abuse. 4.8 In the first situation, the Committee can only reach the same conclusion as the European Court of Human Rights, noting that it was in cassation that the author for the first time invoked the complaint of violation of articles 18 and 26 of the Covenant. Consequently, as it did in the B. Singh case, the Committee should declare the application inadmissible owing to non-exhaustion of domestic remedies. 12 6 The State party refers to the case of B. Singh v. France, para. 7.4.