Case summaries

The Helsinki Supreme Administrative Court decided  that Finland cannot return an Iraqi asylum seeker to Sweden, where he/she faces the risk of being sent back to Baghdad and may be subjected to violations of his/her human rights. The  Supreme Administrative Courtdecided that the ruling of the Finnish Immigration Service had to be reversed and the application for asylum had to be substantively examined in Finland. 

Criminal sanctions against homosexual acts under Article 319 of the Criminal Code of Senegal constitute a deprivation of the fundamental right to live one’s own sexual and emotional life in freedom and are sufficient in themselves to justify granting refugee status.

The concept of a local conflict as referred to in Article 14 of Legislative Decree 251/2007 c) and which is a sufficient reason for granting subsidiary protection should not be understood as applying only to civil war. It should cover all circumstances where conflicts or outbreaks of violence, whatever their origins, between opposing groups or various factions appear to have become permanent and ongoing and widespread, not under the control of the state apparatus or actually benefiting from cultural and political ties with this apparatus.

In a challenge to a decision to refuse subsidiary protection and humanitarian leave to remain, the Court considered the obligation on the decision maker to consider relevant documentation, the obligation to give reasons for a decision to dismiss such evidence, reliance by the Minister on credibility findings by the RAT in denying the earlier application for refugee status and whether an Applicant is required to challenge the RAT findings in a subsequent application for subsidiary protection. The Court found that the Minister had failed to weigh the apparently corroborative documentation against the marginal findings of lack of credibility by the RAT or to give reasons for dismissing or rejecting such documentation.

“If an asylum applicant is shown to be in need, and if it can be expected that an applicant’s fundamental human rights and freedoms would or might be infringed, the administrative authority must give the applicant for asylum or subsidiary protection the benefit of the doubt in relation to the facts stated by the applicant.”

This cases concerns the interpretation of Article 2(c) and Article 9(1)(a) of the Qualification Directive in a case where the two Applicants are Pakistani nationals who are members of the Ahmadi religious community and fear persecution there on the basis of religion.

1. The issue as to whether an asylum-seeker was already protected against political persecution in a third country is only relevant in terms of  the asylum application for recognition of refugee status in the context of the concept of the first country of asylum as defined in EU law in Article 29 of the Asylum Procedures Act (Articles 25 and 26 of the Asylum Procedures Directive).  

2. If the Federal Office has reached a decision on the asylum application in this case, the substantive question of the subsidiarity of refugee protection in the assessment of refugee status is no longer applicable.

The situation in Somalia, in particular in the South and Central regions, should be regarded as a situation of generalised violence resulting from an internal armed conflict.  

A single woman with two illegitimate children from relationships not approved of by the family (who are Muslim) may be subject to inhuman or degrading treatment in the country of origin by the members of her family.

The particular social group within the meaning of the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees is the group comprising single mothers of illegitimate children living in Muslim families and societies.

The notion of “well-founded fear” has not been precisely defined. However, it is commonly accepted that it must necessarily contain two elements: a subjective element (the party has a real and credible fear of persecution) and an objective element (this fear has a basis in reality).  A person applying for refugee status should present facts and possibly evidence confirming that they were persecuted in the past or that they fear persecution upon returning to their country of origin. Other reasons for a foreigner leaving their country of origin or fearing a return to their country of origin are immaterial as regards recognition of their refugee status.