Belgium - Council for Alien Law Litigation, 21 September 2012, No. 87989
Keywords:
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Country of origin information
Description
"Information used by the Member States authorities to analyse the socio-political situation in countries of origin of applicants for international protection (and, where necessary, in countries through which they have transited) in the assessment, carried out on an individual basis, of an application for international protection.” It includes all relevant facts as they relate to the country of origin at the time of taking a decision on the application, obtained from various sources, including the laws and regulations of the country of origin and the manner in which they are applied, regulations of the country of origin, plus general public sources, such as reports from (inter)national organisations, governmental and non-governmental organisations, media, bi-lateral contacts in countries of origin, embassy reports, etc. This information is also used inter alia for taking decisions on other migration issues, e.g. on return, as well as by researchers. One of the stated aims of the European Asylum Support Office (EASO) is to progressively bring all activities related to practical cooperation on asylum under its roof, to include the collection of Country of Origin Information and a common approach to its use. |
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Credibility assessment
Description
Assessment made in adjudicating an application for a visa, or other immigration status, in order to determine whether the information presented by the applicant is consistent and credible. |
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First country of asylum
Description
"A country can be considered to be a first country of asylum for a particular applicant for asylum if: (a) he/she has been recognised in that country as a refugee and he/she can still avail himself/herself of that protection; or (b) he/she otherwise enjoys sufficient protection in that country, including benefiting from the principle of non-refoulement; provided that he/she will be re-admitted to that country." Member States may consider an application for asylum as inadmissible if a country which is not a Member State is considered as a first country of asylum for the applicant. |
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Country of origin
Description
The country (or countries) which are a source of migratory flows and of which a migrant may have citizenship. In refugee context, this means the country (or countries) of nationality or, for stateless persons, of former habitual residence. |
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Obligation to give reasons
Description
Obligation on a decision-maker to give reasons for an administrative decision including applications for international protection and decisions taken under the Dublin II Regulation |
Headnote:
The CGRS (Office of the Commissioner-General for Refugees and Stateless Persons) may not dispute the nationality of an asylum seeker without taking into account the official documents that he has filed.
Facts:
The Applicant, who claimed to be Somali, had supposedly lived for several years in a refugee camp in Kenya. He maintained that he had returned to Somalia but was then forced to flee from there a second time due to persecution by Al-Shabab militants.
The CGRS found the Applicant’s account of the persecution suffered when he allegedly returned to Somalia to be inconsistent. Consequently, it did not believe that the Applicant was of Somali nationality. It therefore analysed the application in relation to the Applicant’s country of habitual residence, Kenya. It concluded that the Applicant did not have a well-founded fear of persecution in Kenya and rejected his claim.
Decision & reasoning:
The judge criticised the CGRS for not ‘actually’ disputing the Applicant’s Somali nationality. It found in particular that the CGRS had not taken into account evidence of the Applicant’s registration in a camp for Somali refugees in Kenya. Such evidence could constitute an ‘indication’ of the Applicant’s Somali nationality.
The judge therefore quashed the CGRS’s decision. He required the CGRS to take further investigative measures to establish whether or not the Applicant was of Somali nationality, noting that if the Applicant was indeed Somali, it would be necessary to examine the risk of him suffering indiscriminate violence in Somalia.
Outcome:
Quashed and sent back to the CGRS.
Observations/comments:
In this judgment, the CALL required the CGRS to take into account evidence of registration in a refugee camp issued by the NGO responsible for the camp.
In so doing, the CALL anticipated the ECtHR’s decision in Singh (33210/11), which criticised the Belgian authorities for disputing the Applicants’ nationalities without taking account of a UNHCR attestation.
A ‘first country of asylum’ ground of inadmissibility was not in force under Belgian law at the time this judgment was delivered. It is in force now (Article 48/5, Section 4 of the Law of 15 December 1980, as modified by the Law of 8 May 2013). However, the judgment is still relevant, since the examination to be carried out in relation to a first country of asylum differs from that to be carried out in relation to a country of nationality (for example, regarding the possibility of readmission into the first country of asylum).
Cited National Legislation:
| Cited National Legislation |
| Belgium - Vreemdelingenwet/loi sur les étrangers 15/12/1980 (Aliens Act) - Artikle 48/4 |