Case summaries
The Court considered that the decision-maker should have had taken into consideration the applicant’s alleged vulnerable situation, and as a result ordered the case’s remittal to the Central Administrative Court of Lisbon so evidence could be collected on this.
The Federal Administrative Court has to clarify whether the petition for action directed solely at the obligation to decide on the asylum application is admissible. The question if it is also possible to directly oblige the defendant to grant international protection or to establish prohibitions on deportation by means of an action is not the subject of the decision. As a result, the court comes to the conclusion that there was a delay by the respondent of providing the decision on the asylum application without sufficient reason and that the plaintiff has a need for legal protection for its action for failure to act.
The judgment deals with the admissibility of the execution of an expulsion order of an Eritrean who illegally left the country. Despite the assumption that the entry into the national service in the country of origin constitutes forced labour within the meaning of Art. 4 para. 2 ECHR, enforcement is permissible since there was no flagrant violation of Art. 4 para. 2 ECHR.
Article 3 has not been violated in a case concerning the deportation of an individual who had been convicted of a terrorism-related charge to Morocco. However the ECtHR acknowledges that ill-treatment and torture by the police and the security forces still occur, particularly in the case of persons suspected of terrorism or of endangering State security.
The Administrative Chamber of the Spanish Supreme Court established that Spain is bound by two Council Decisions of May and September 2015 establishing an EU Emergency Relocation Mechanism aimed at distributing a number of refugees that have arrived to Italy and Greece.
The Constitutional Council decided on the criminal exemptions in favour of persons involved in the crime of assisting aliens to irregularly stay in a country. The first sentence of article L. 622-4 of the code of entry and stay of foreigners and the right to asylum (CESEDA) is unconstitutional as it must include not only the assistance to irregular stay in a country but also the assistance to the movement of aliens being in an irregular situation. The Council also specifies, in relation to the third paragraph of the above-mentioned article, that it is to be applied to any act assisting aliens to irregularly stay when motivated by humanitarian purposes. The Council hence enshrines the constitutional value of the fraternity principle.
Following on from a Rule 39 measure from the European Court of Human Rights preventing the transfer of the applicant to Bulgaria under the Dublin Regulation, the Tribunal ordered the police prefect to register the applicant's claim for asylum in France.
The case concerned the application of a take back request under the the Dublin III Regulation where an asylum applicant has lodged multiple asylum applications in two different Member States and is the subject of a European Arrest Warrant.
The applicant, an Algerian national convicted in France for terrorism and banned from entering French territory in 2006, was sent back to Algeria in 2014, on the day he was notified of the rejection of his asylum claim and of the issuance of his return order. The Court found that the French authorities violated Article 34 of the Convention by carrying out the applicant’s transfer despite the Court’s interim measure. It also found that France violated Article 3, in the light of the general information regarding the situation of people suspected of international terrorism in Algeria.