Case summaries

Three Somali girls were considered to have a well-founded fear of being forced to undergo female genital mutilation and therefore gender-based persecution, which entitled them to be granted refugee status.

As the Republic of Slovenia agreed to readmit the Applicant in accordance with the terms defined in the Dublin Convention, he should be treated as an applicant for international protection from the moment he entered the country. Taking this into account, it was not acceptable to apply measures that are stipulated in the legislation for foreigners who did not apply for international protection. The Applicant’s freedom of movement could be restricted only under the terms and conditions that are used for Applicants for international protection.

In the case at hand there were no grounds on which to restrict the Applicant’s right to personal freedom. By housing the Applicant in an Asylum Centre for a disputed period of time, his right to personal freedom was unacceptably restricted.

The Convention relating to the Status of Refugees contains a finite list of grounds on which refugee status may be recognised and does not include victims of war, natural disasters, or famine, family situation, unemployment, lack of educational opportunities, or poverty.

The assessment of whether the foreignor's fear of persecution is justified must therefore be performed with reference to the individual case in question and in the light of the general social, legal, political, and economic situation of the country of origin of the foreignor applying for refugee status.

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 the legality of a circular in French law which was challenged by two organisations on the basis that it was contrary to EU Law under the Reception Conditions Directive in so far as it excludes asylum seekers from entitlement to allowances if they are in the Dublin procedure in France. The CJEU held that the Reception Conditions Directive applies in such a scenario and therefore asylum seekers in the Dublin procedure should have access to the minimum reception conditions laid down in that Directive. This obligation ceases when the person is actually transferred to another Member State.

The court ordered the Office of Immigration and Nationality to conduct new proceedings. The mere fact that national security risk factors arise vis-à-vis a person is not sufficient reason to exclude them from refugee or subsidiary protection status.

The European Court of Human Rights held that the expulsion of an Algerian national from Slovakia to Algeria, in contempt of an interim measure issued by the Court, was in violation of Articles 3, 13 and 34 of the Convention.

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.