KURT JUDGMENT OF 25 MAY 1998 34 IV. ALLEGED VIOLATION OF ARTICLE 3 OF THE CONVENTION IN RESPECT OF THE APPLICANT HERSELF 130. The applicant contended that she herself was the victim of inhuman and degrading treatment on account of her son’s disappearance at the hands of the authorities. She requested the Court to find, like the Commission, that the suffering which she has endured engages the responsibility of the respondent State under Article 3 of the Convention. She invoked in support of her argument the decision of the United Nations Human Rights Committee in the case of Quinteros v. Uruguay of 21 July 1983 (see paragraph 71 above) affirming that the next-of-kin of disappeared persons must also be considered victims of, inter alia, illtreatment. 131. The Commission considered that the uncertainty, doubt and apprehension suffered by the applicant over a prolonged and continuing period of time caused her severe mental distress and anguish. Having regard to its conclusion that the disappearance of her son was imputable to the authorities, the Commission found that she had been subjected to inhuman and degrading treatment within the meaning of Article 3. 132. The Government contested the Commission’s conclusion, reiterating that there was no credible evidence to support the applicant’s view that her son had been detained by the security forces. While sympathising with the applicant’s plight, they contended that there was no causal link between the alleged violation of her son’s rights under the Convention and her distress and anguish. 133. The Court notes that ill-treatment must attain a minimum level of severity if it is to fall within the scope of Article 3 (see, among other authorities, the Cruz Varas and Others v. Sweden judgment of 20 March 1991, Series A no. 201, p. 31, § 83). It recalls in this respect that the applicant approached the public prosecutor in the days following her son’s disappearance in the definite belief that he had been taken into custody. She had witnessed his detention in the village with her own eyes and his nonappearance since that last sighting made her fear for his safety, as shown by her petitions of 30 November and 15 December 1993 (see paragraphs 39 and 42 above). However, the public prosecutor gave no serious consideration to her complaint, preferring instead to take at face value the gendarmes’ supposition that her son had been kidnapped by the PKK. As a result, she has been left with the anguish of knowing that her son had been detained and that there is a complete absence of official information as to his subsequent fate. This anguish has endured over a prolonged period of time.