Case summaries

The CJEU ruling concerned the scope of protection available under EU law to third country nationals suffering from serious illness whose removal would amount to inhuman or degrading treatment. The CJEU surmisedthat the removal of a person suffering a serious illness to a country where appropriate treatment was not available could in exceptional circumstances be contrary to the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, and in such circumstances their removal had to be suspended pursuant to Directive 2008/115/EC on common standards and procedures in Member States for returning illegally staying third-country nationals. The Directive 2008/115/EC required the provision of emergency health care and essential treatment of illness to be made available to such persons during the period in which the Member State is required to postpone their removal.

The CJEU ruling concerned the scope of protection available under EU law to third country nationals suffering from serious illness whose removal would amount to inhuman or degrading treatment. The CJEU ruled that, although the removal of a seriously ill person could in exceptional circumstances amount to a breach of Article 3 ECHR, the Qualification Directive (2004/83/EC) is to be interpreted as not requiring a Member State to grant the social welfare and health care benefits to a third country national who has been granted leave to reside in the territory of that Member State under national legislation.

The return of a Pakistani national of the Ahmadiyya religion to Pakistan would violate Article 3. The French authorities had wrongly rejected the Ahmadiyya Applicant’s credibility, which is supported by evidence of prosecution by the Pakistani authorities for blasphemy.

A Russian Federation citizen, originally from Chechnya, had applied for international protection in Finland due to threat of persecution based on his/her family’s political activities. The Applicant had been diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder because of torture. According to the Immigration Service, he/she could resort to internal relocation as specified in Section 88e of the Aliens Act and there were no grounds for granting international protection. The Administrative Court rejected the appeal. The Supreme Administrative Court took the view that the Applicant has had close ties to the Komi Republic and had no problems with the authorities while living there. Therefore he/she can be expected to rely on internal relocation to another part of the country, as specified in Article 88e of the Aliens Act and he/she was not in need of international protection.

Instead of non-refoulement, the Court granted the Applicant subsidiary protection status because he would be at risk of serious harm upon returning to his home country (torture, cruel, inhuman, degrading treatment or punishment).

Application from the Turkish Authorities to have the Greek Judicial Authorities issue an extradition notice against A.F., a Turkish citizen seeking asylum in Greece.

The Court ruled against the Turkish Authorities' extradition request, deciding that if the person in question were extradited to Turkey there would be a risk that her situation would be made worse because of her political beliefs and because of her pending application to have her refugee status recognised by the Greek state.

The case concerns the risk of ill-treatment that the applicant would be exposed to if he were sent back to Chad, where he has been already tortured and summoned by the prosecutorial authorities for alleged collaboration with the rebels.

A Gambian asylum seeker’s account of approximately eight years’ imprisonment and torture there was not considered credible. The Immigration Service and the Helsinki Supreme Administrative Courtconsidered the application to be manifestly unfounded and  the Supreme Administrative Court did not give leave to appeal on the matter. The UN Committee against Torture had, however, requested that the Applicant   not be returned to his home country, The Gambia, until UNCAT had examined the complaint. 

The Applicant left his country of origin (Iran) in 2003 having been arrested, illegally detained and tortured because of his participation in demonstrations against the regime in 1999. He told the Committee that he had occasionally participated in the anti-regime activities of Iranians in Greece, and that he did not wish to return to Iran because he feared that he would be imprisoned again and would be subjected to torture. Concerning his religious beliefs, he stated that he was an atheist. The Committee accepted that the torture suffered by the Applicant in his country of origin constituted previous persecution. However, the Committee believed that there was no a well-founded fear of persecution now or in the future because of his prior actions, nor because of his prior actions in conjunction with circumstances which occurred in Greece (participation in Iranian movements), nor even because of the Applicant's atheism and, therefore, that the fear of persecution was not well-founded. Nevertheless, the Committee acknowledged that “there may have been situations in which the Applicant was persecuted in the country of origin, but he has no present or future fear of persecution there. However, it is appropriate to recognise him as a refugee because of the compelling reasons arising from previous persecution, especially when the persecution he suffered was particularly atrocious”; and it unanimously recognised the Applicant's refugee status because it held that the Applicant had suffered terrible persecution in the past because of his anti-regime activities (political opinion) without the situation in his country of origin having since improved, and because the Applicant continued to suffer the consequences of his psychological harm, meaning that his return to Iran and his life there would be intolerable.

This case concerned exclusion from refugee status on the basis of a war crime and a serious non-political crime.

A Chechen who was involved in the Second Chechen War - outside of the general combat action - in the killing and wounding of Russian soldiers and the kidnapping of a Russian officer to force the release of another Chechen is at risk of being exposed to torture or at least inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment in the Russian Federation.