Despite the decisions issued by the United Nations calling the Algerian Government to carry out thorough investigations into the circumstances of the disappearances and of the summary executions, no action was ever taken by the Algerian authorities to shed light on the fate of the victims, which led the concerned families to address official bodies and request the implementation of the UN decisions.

In response, the Algerian authorities requested that the public prosecutor's office summon the families of the victims before the Taher Court in order to question them. On 9 February 2015, Mrs Zohra Boudehane, wife and mother of the disappeared Tahar and Bachir Bourefis, and Mrs Sakina Belhimer, wife of Bachir Bourefis, have had to go to the public prosecutor's office of Taher, where they were questioned on the reasons of their appeals to the Committee.

10 days later, on 19 February 2015, Mr Khalifa Fedsi, father of two brothers summarily executed by the Daïra leader (sub-prefect), was escorted by policemen in front of the same prosecutor, who questioned him on the circumstances of the case.

Alkarama had already addressed an initial letter to the HRCtee on 3 March 2015, informing it of these attempts by the authorities to exert pressure on the families which had complained.

The Algerian Government had then been invited by the Committee to « make sure that the authors of the communications [...] as well as the members of their families are in no case subject to prosecution, pressure or any other form of intimidation while exercising their right of having submitted their communications to the Committee ». The Government was also asked to inform the Committee of any decision taken concerning this issue within 30 days.

Notwithstanding this injunction, the authorities persisted in their intimidating manoeuvres towards the families of the victims; in fact, on 11 March 2015, Mrs Zohra Boudehane was again requested to go to the prosecutor's office in Taher, where she went accompanied by her grandchild; the officer who received her stated then that those responsible for the disappearance of her husband and children were unknown. When she mentioned the decision of the Committee, the official replied was that «the UN was working against Algeria», while trying to force her to sign a document, which she refused to do.

Mrs Sakina Belhimer, who went to the same prosecutor's office later that day also refused to sign a document whose content she was not aware of; her son, who was accompanying her, requested to know the content of the document and was refused.

The following day, he was questioned by gendarmes in the middle of the street, where in a threatening manner he was asked whether he knew the face of the chief warrant officer Said Gueham, the man responsible for his father's disappearance, whose name appears in the appeal to the Committee.

After this, further families were summoned by the gendarmes to be questioned, some of them more than once.

It is clear that by acting this way, the Algerian authorities try to exert pressure on the families of the victims who have appealed to the Committee, so as to discourage them from pursuing their goals.
It seems obvious that the authorities have chosen to act according to a procedure which is not effectively implementing the decisions taken by the HRCtee, and Alkarama fears that this practice may in the future discourage other relatives of victims of grave human rights from appealing to the Court.

Condemning these practices, Alkarama has solicited the urgent intervention of the UN Human Rights Committee (HRCtee) to call upon the Algerian authorities to stop exerting pressure or any other form of threat on the families of the victims concerned by the decisions of the HRCtee.

In the same way, Alkarama also reminds Algeria that it shall act in good faith when putting into practice its international obligations deriving directly from the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which it ratified in 1989.

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