Case summaries

The Supreme Court held that an immigrant whose passport or equivalent identity document reveals their minority cannot be subjected to additional tests in order to determine his age unless a proportionality judgment about the document’s reliability has first been carried out. The Court also held that medical techniques to determine an age cannot be applied indiscriminately.

In the procedure for extending subsidiary protection all reasons that the Applicant stated in his application for international protection are relevant and not merely the reasons on the basis of which subsidiary protection was recognised.

The Applicant had been forced to leave the UNRWA’s area of operations. The facts that had led to his departure from Lebanon justified ending his exclusion from the application of Article 1D of the Geneva Convention.

A foreigner shall cease to be eligible for subsidiary protection when the circumstances which led to the granting of subsidiary protection status have ceased to exist or have changed to such a degree that protection is no longer required. The relevant provision refers to two separate reasons that justify revoking subsidiary protection. The first is that the circumstances which led to the granting of such protection have ceased to exist. The second is that those circumstances have changed, although the change of circumstances must be of such a significant and non-temporary nature that the foreigner no longer faces a real risk of serious harm.

Subsidiary protection cannot establish a right that is comparable to, for instance, the right to obtain permission for temporary stay or indefinite leave to remain.

The Migration Office of the Ministry of Interior of the Slovak Republic may not revoke subsidiary protection in a procedure on extension of subsidiary protection initiated under Section 20(3) of the Asylum Act on the basis of an application to extend protection.

Under Section 20(3) of the Asylum Act, the procedure may result only in a decision to extend or not to extend protection.

In order to assess the change of circumstances where refugee status ceased to exist, the competent authorities must “verify, having regard to the refugee’s individual situation, that the actor or actors of protection[…], which may include international organisations controlling the State or a substantial part of the territory of the State, including through the presence of a multinational force in that territory, have taken reasonable steps to prevent persecution, that they therefore operate, in particular, an effective legal system for the detention, prosecution and punishment of acts constituting persecution and that the national concerned will have access to such protection if he ceases to have refugee status”.

Refugee status was revoked when an individual applied for and received a new passport issued by his/her country of origin.

Application of the CJEU ‘s ruling of the 2 March 2010, Abdulla et al. Case C 175/08 et al, following the request for a preliminary ruling by the Federal Administrative Court.

The High Administrative Court was correct in holding that the circumstances upon which the recognition of refugee status was based have ceased to exist. However, it did not examine sufficiently whether a well-founded fear of persecution persists for other reasons.

This case concerned the application of the principle of family unity, where the sponsor had been granted asylum and subsequently acquired the nationality of the country of refuge.

This case concerns the interpretation of Article 11 of the Qualification Directive when refugee status is deemed to have ceased to exist. The Court found this is when there has been change of circumstances which is significant and non-temporary and when there is no well-founded fear or other reason to risk being persecuted. States in assessing changes in circumstances must verify that the actors of protection have taken reasonable steps to prevent the persecution and that the person concerned has access to that protection. In making the assessment that there is no further risk the standard of probability used is the same that applied when refugee status was granted.