Germany - High Administrative Court of Baden-Wurttemberg, 20 May 2008, A 10 S 72/08

Facts:

The applicant, born in 1988, came to Germany as an unaccompanied minor and applied for asylum in March 2004, stating that he had been harassed at school for belonging to the Ahmadiyya religious community. After he was hit by a car his father feared for his life and sent him abroad.

The authorities rejected the application in May 2004. The applicant appealed this decision at the Administrative Court of Karlsruhe, claiming that the Ahmadiyya community was persecuted as a group in Pakistan. The Administrative Court dismissed the appeal in October 2007. The Court accepted that members of the Ahmadiyya community suffered discrimination in Pakistan, however, the acts at issue could not be described as acts of persecution even if they were accumulated.

The High Administrative Court granted leave for a further appeal (Berufung). In this procedure the applicant claimed that Penal Law in Pakistan, which outlawed the Ahmadiyya religious community, together with other discriminatory laws and practices, violated the human right to freedom of religion which was protected by the Qualification Directive.

Decision & reasoning:

The protection of freedom of religion under the Qualification Directive goes further than the protection granted under former German asylum case law. Art 10.1 (b) of the Qualification Directive grants very wide-reaching protection as it does not only cover the decision to lead a religious life out of an inner conviction, but also the decision to abstain from any religious activities out of a lack of interest in religion. Furthermore, the Qualification Directive provides that any individual may profess his religious views to the outside world by referring inparticular to participation in religious acts in public, alone or in community with others.

The Ahmadis are discriminated against in Pakistan, both in terms of legislation and in legal practice. Numerous criminal procedures are pending against members of the Ahmadiyya. The pressure on them is growing both from state and from non-state actors. The number of such criminal procedures, and other acts of persecution against Ahmadis, may be low in relation to their total number, but this may well be the case because many of them forego the right to practice their religion. This fact therefore cannot be used as an argument against the existence of “group perscution”. 

However, group persecution can only be assumed for those members of the Ahmadiyya community who feel inwardly bonded to their religion. According to their own statements, the community has about 4 million members, out of which only about 500,000 to 600,000 are professed Ahmadis. The High Administrative Court is convinced that the applicant has not been and is not a professing Ahmadi, as his statements concerning this matter are not plausible.

Outcome:

The further appeal to the High Administrative Court was rejected.

Subsequent proceedings:

None (the High Administrative Court did not grant leave for a further review/Revision to the Federal Administrative Court).