Case summaries
The case concerned Somali and Eritrean migrants travelling from Libya who had been intercepted at sea by the Italian authorities and sent back to Libya. Returning them to Libya without examining their case exposed them to a risk of ill-treatment and amounted to a collective expulsion.
The case concerned a complaint by two Somali nationals that they risked being ill-treated or killed if returned to Mogadishu from the UK.
In this case the Tribunal considered the general country situation in Somalia as at the date of decision for five applicants, both men and women from Mogadishu, south or central Somalia, Somaliland and Puntland. The risk of female genital mutilation (FGM) was also considered.
An applicant from Somalia was eligible for refugee status. The court found:
- There was sufficient probability that the applicant’s life and freedom, in case of return to Somalia, were at risk due to his membership of a particular social group.
- Clan membership constitutes a particular social group.
- Protection against persecution is not provided by the State, by parties or by other organisations in Somalia.
- There is no internal protection in Somalia.
If an applicant has serious criticism of a language test conducted to determine their country of origin, the Migration Board must investigate the grounds before making a decision, or at least respond to the applicant's criticism so that the submission can be completed.
If the Migration Court considers a language test report to be unreliable or inadequate, it can decide to request a new language analysis or return the case to the Migration Board for further investigation, but cannot choose to ignore the analysis entirely.
Restriction of movement due to the lack of official identification papers can occur only when the Applicant raises sufficient doubt as regards the credibility of his declared identity, at which the actual circumstances of the case at hand need to be taken into account.
The restriction of movement due to the presence of the Applicant’s fingerprints in the EURODAC base is permissible only if the actual circumstances of the case at hand indicate that the Applicant might flee.
Refugee status was granted on the basis of a well-founded fear of persecution based on the applicant facing a second act of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) on return to Somalia (persecution ground: membership of a particular social group).
The situation which prevails today in some geographical areas of Somalia, in particular in and around Mogadishu, must be seen as a situation of generalised violence resulting from a situation of internal armed conflict, in the meaning of Article L.712-1 c) Ceseda [which transposes Article 15 (c) of the Qualification Directive].
The Helsinki Administrative Court held that returning a single mother with her two children to Malta to the conditions described and investigated, among others, in a UN Report of the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention Mission to Malta, and on the European Parliament’s LIBE Committee report on Maltese detention centres may cause the family to face inhuman treatment.