Case summaries

The Minister for Immigration and Asylum must, when making an assessment of whether the applicant is eligible for asylum where there is no internal protection alternative, take into consideration the general circumstances in that part of the country and the applicant’s personal circumstances at the time of the decision.

The Court held that the conditions for offering the Applicants temporary judicial protection had been satisfied, taking into consideration that the Asylum Committee had rejected the asylum-seeker's claims as being unsubstantiated without assessing his credibility, and also because the decision which rejected the application for asylum only vaguely referred to the prevailing situation in Iran.

The Council of State ruled that in support of an application for subsidiary protection a mere reference to the general situation in the country of origin is in principle insufficient, and that the applicant needs to make a link between that general situation and his/her personal circumstances.

There is not an internal armed conflict in Iraq. Also, the applicant has not shown that he is eligible for protection because of other severe conflict in the region.

Within the meaning of Section 8 of the Asylum Act, a particular social group is a group of people who share a common characteristic which is objectively given or is perceived as such by society. The characteristic in question usually has an innate, unchangeable form or is otherwise fundamental to human identity, conscience or the exercise of the human rights of the persons affected. 

It therefore usually comprises a group of people of similar social origin or status, social habits and customs, or of a similar sexual orientation, who are in a minority due to their otherness.

The Council of State ruled that significant similarities between accounts that were being presented by different asylum seekers with the same nationality, ethnic origin and provenance, who applied for asylum in the same period of time, was certainly remarkable, even suspicious, but that this suspicion alone does not  suffice to establish fraud by the applicants.

Honour-related violence should be examined in the context of grounds for protection and not humanitarian considerations. The Migration Court of Appeal also discussed the application of the benefit of the doubt.

This case examines why asylum or protection grounds should be examined carefully before the issuing of a permit may be considered for ‘exceptionally distressing circumstances’ as expressed in Chapter 5 Section 6 of the Aliens Act. Once an applicant has been assessed as having a reasonably likely need for protection against a specific part of the country of origin, then the assessment of whether there is an internal flight alternative must be carried out within the framework of the provisions on protection.

The Migration Court of Appeal concluded that the Migration Court made an error in carrying out a credibility assessment before evaluating the evidence. The Migration Board and the Courts must first consider if an applicant was able to make his or her account plausible based on the evidence relied on, and only thereafter make a credibility assessment.

The Court emphasised that an applicant may have the advantage of the benefit of the doubt if his or her account appears credible. In this case, the applicant was deemed not credible and therefore the benefit of the doubt was not applied.

It is important to carefully distinguish between what constitutes evidence and information submitted by the applicant.