Case summaries
The House of Lords confirmed that in addition to establishing a real risk of harm, the applicant would also have to show that their state has failed to provide reasonable protection.
The Court considered whether an application for international protection by an applicant of Russian nationality based on experiences of persecution in Lithuania (country of asylum) could be dismissed based on the reasoning that Lithuania is deemed to be a safe country of asylum. The Administrative Court held that the question of whether the applicants are in need of international protection based on the treatment they have received in their country of asylum, Lithuania, could not be examined in an asylum procedure in Lithuania.
The Court of Appeal gave guidance on the relevant factors to consider in assessing claims for protection against persecution from non-state actors under the Refugee Convention and Article 3 of the ECHR.
Where the actors of persecution feared are themselves state agents consideration must still be given to whether the applicant can avail himself of protection, but this assessment must be made in context. There will be a spectrum of cases between, on the one extreme, those where the only ill-treatment is by non-state actors and, on the other extreme, those where the state itself is wholly complicit in the ill-treatment.