Case summaries

An applicant may not be detained with a view to carrying out a transfer under the Dublin Regulation, in the absence of objective criteria for assessing the existence of a significant risk of absconding, defined in a binding legal provision of general application.

The case concerns the validity of the first subparagraph of Article 8(3)(a) and (b) of the Receptions Conditions Directive in the light of Article 6 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights. 

The case concerns the calculation of time limits for detention for the purpose of a Dublin transfer under Article 28 of the Dublin III Regulation (DRIII).

The Court of Justice of the European Union rejected the actions brought by Hungary and Slovakia seeking the annulment of the so-called “Relocation Decision”.

The right to be heard entails the obligation of the court to take note of the arguments put forward by the parties and to take these arguments into consideration when taking its decision. While this does not require the court to explicitly address every single fact put forward by the parties, the grounds of the decision have to refer to the essential issues raised by such facts.

In case of a single mother and her four minor children facing deportation to a country where beneficiaries of international protection had to live under difficult conditions, these personal circumstances of the applicants are of key importance to the legal evaluation. Independently of the question, whether deportations to Bulgaria were, in light of the current conditions, generally permissible, the provisions of Art. 21 et seqq. of the Reception Conditions Directive clearly stipulated that the concerns of families with children had to be given particular consideration.

Consequently, under such circumstances a court was required to specifically set out why it assumed that the family would be guaranteed suitable accommodation that excluded the possibility of health risks and met the needs of a family with children. Otherwise, the decision amounts to an infringement of the applicant’s right to be heard under Art. 103 (1) of the Basic Law.

Article 27(1) of the Dublin Regulation is to be interpreted as meaning that an applicant for international protection may rely, in the context of an action brought against a decision to transfer him, on the expiry of a period laid down in Article 21(1) of that regulation, even if the requested Member State is willing to take charge of that applicant.

The two-month period for submitting a take charge request where there has been a Eurodac hit is not cumulative with the general three-month period for take charge requests.

An application for international protection is deemed to have been lodged if a written document, prepared by a public authority and certifying that a third-country national has requested international protection, has reached the authority responsible for implementing the obligations arising from that regulation, and as the case may be, if only the main information contained in such a document, but not that document or a copy thereof, has reached that authority.

The reduction in the financial allowance available to child dependants of asylum seekers was not contrary to the requirement that the best interests of the child be a primary consideration in all actions concerning children.

It is an appeal against the decision handed down by the Northern Central Administrative Court that denied the request to annul the order issued by the National Director of the Aliens and Borders Service.

The appeal was declared well-founded by the Supreme Administrative Court, considering the disregard of an essential formality that the law prescribes. Therefore, the decision determined the revocation of the judgment under appeal and the annulment of the contested act.

A waiver to file an appeal against custody prior to deportation is only possible under strict conditions. Particularly there has to be a qualified legal representation when signing the waiver.

The risk of absconding in the sense of Art. 76a Residence Act cannot be assumed because of the mere fact that another state is responsible for the asylum procedure of that person.

The Federal Supreme Court rules that the separate detention of families with minor children and the placement in a children’s home violates the right to family life in Art. 8 ECHR, if less intrusive measures than detention have not been taken into consideration.