Anxious scrutiny has been given the expert report from [name of expert]. It is noted that the report was produced for your solicitor “under her instruction” to aid your asylum claim. It is therefore not objective information and it is clear you were not subject to the cross examination that...
Kent Law Clinic has published a new report, How Children Become Failed Asylum Seekers, which needs to be read by anyone representing children in asylum cases. Taking the files of 25 “failed asylum seekers” who had arrived in Kent as children, they reviewed the decision making process of the Home Office,...
The phased withdrawal of US forces has not led to a return to generalised sectarian conflict and indeed appears to have resulted in a significant annualised drop in the number of security incidents … the most likely development is that the levels of violence will either continue to reduce or remain...
A fascinating study of power play and relationships inside and outside the hearing room has been published as a working paper by the Refugee Studies Centre at the University of Oxford: The culture of disbelief: an ethnographic approach to understanding an under-theorised concept in the UK asylum system by Jessica Anderson,...
In an e-mail posting on a practitioners’ discussion group last week, a representative asked the group for details of a psychiatrist in order to prove that the detained client is gay. In follow-up e-mails, it was revealed that the enquiry was prompted by Counsel’s advice, and that the author meant...
Asylum Aid has published a new report, Even If… The use of the Internal Protection Alternative in asylum decisions in the UK, analysing the reasoning on internal protection or internal relocation in Home Office asylum decisions, identifying a number of failings appearing frequently in the decisions read for the research....
Nearly 3 years after the end of the civil war in Libya that swept away the Qadhafi regime and its associated country guidance, and after nearly 8 months of deliberation, the Upper Tribunal has decided that Libya isn’t so bad after all, at least for men. The determination of AT...
In MF (Albania) v SSHD [2014] EWCA Civ 902, the Court of Appeal considered and upheld the criticisms of the appellant’s country expert made by the Upper Tribunal. In doing so, the Court appeared to disapprove of the practice of instructing expert witnesses to comment on particular findings made by...
HM Chief Inspector of Prisons report on an unannounced inspection of Dover Immigration Removal Centre (IRC) between 3–14 March 2014 (published 7 July 2014) once again highlights critical concerns surrounding Rule 35 of the Detention Centre Rules 2001. Dover IRC is generally commended, although its atmosphere appears to remain that...
Yesterday I gave a short talk at an event organised by the Campaign to Close Campsfield as part of Oxford Refugee Week. It was an excellent, well attended event in a packed room at the town hall and I’m grateful for the chance to have spoken. My first demonstration was...
Judgment has finally been handed down in the latest test case on Dublin removals to Italy, Tabrizagh and others v SSHD [2014] EWHC 1914 (Admin) and although it is on any view bad news, there is much in it to consider. In a carefully reasoned and frankly impressive decision the...
The present Government has declared its intention to create a ‘hostile environment’ for migrants. True to its word, the Go Home vans, the ‘papers please’ raids on public transport hubs, the targeting of foreign students, the increasingly demented bureaucracy of the immigration rules and the harsh family migration rules are...
According to the Independent newspaper, scientists have located “the conscience.” It’s in the front part of the brain and is the size of a Brussels’ sprout. For those who object to military service on grounds of conscience, this is where the action happens. The UNHCR’s “Guidelines on Military Service“, published...
Very pleased to have played a role in bringing about this review: it was here on Free Movement that the case referred to by May was revealed before being picked up by The Observer. A Home Office document leaked earlier this year revealed how one bisexual asylum seeker was asked...
A Parliamentary written answer yesterday revealed that of the Syrians that managed to get to the UK to claim asylum in 2013, 24 were forcibly removed and a further 20 remain in immigration detention today. That seems to me truly shocking. It certainly gives lie to the UK Government’s hollow...
So says the tribunal in MD (same-sex oriented males: risk) India CG [2014] UKUT 65 (IAC), anyway. And even if there was risk in the home area, the tribunal considers that relocation within India is generally reasonable and “LGBT support organisations” can provide help going underground if need be (para 170)....
The Home Office have started giving directions for the removal of failed asylum seekers to Mogadishu on Turkish Airline flights via Istanbul. Anyone given such removal directions might ask the Home Office to reconsider whether they risk violating their human rights in the light of the announcement by Al Shabaab...
Any asylum practitioner is likely to come across cases where, rather than investigate the merits of an asylum claim, the Home Office seeks to return their client to a third country elsewhere in the European Union deemed under the Dublin II Regulation to have prior responsibility for assessing the claim,...
Reading through the Home Office’s response to a recent Home Affairs Select Committee, this jumped out at me: The Home Office does not permit caseworkers to ask prurient questions about sexual matters or require applicants to produce sexually explicit material in support of their claim. This is somewhat questionable given...
You might be forgiven for thinking that when the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has already recognised an individual’s status as a refugee, national decision-makers would ordinarily follow suit. After all, UNHCR has unmatched expertise in refugee status determinations, and its determinations are normally made closer in time and...
The following questions are transcribed from the interviewer’s written record of an interview with a detained asylum seeker who stated he was bisexual. The interview took place in October 2013, beginning at 10.25am and ending at 4pm. There was a one hour break for lunch. No lawyer was present at...
Largely unnoticed by many, on 1 January 2014 a new legal regime entered force regarding the allocation of responsibility for considering asylum claims from persons who have entered the country from elsewhere in the European Union: Regulation (EU) No 604/2013 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 June...
Official headnote: (1) All Turkish males are required to undergo military service but exemption can be granted on the grounds of physical or mental disability which includes “sexual identity disorder”. (2) Homosexuality is regarded by the Turkish army as a sexual identity disorder but the perception of homosexuality in Turkey...
Both parties and practitioners are entitled to expect that the practice and procedure of the court in which their case is heard will be consistent and fair irrespective of which court it is and where it is. Yet a Freedom of Information Act 2000 request made by academics at the...
Permission has been granted by the Court of Appeal to challenge the outcome of the recent Country Guidance case on Sri Lanka, GJ and Others (post-civil war: returnees) Sri Lanka CG [2013] UKUT 00319 (IAC) (previous post: “New Sri Lankan Country Guidance“). A copy of the Order granting permission can be found here....
According to the recent Missing the Mark report by the excellent UK Lesbian and Gay Immigration Group, a worryingly high proportion of LGBTI asylum claims are refused because the Home Office does not believe that the claimant has ‘proved’ his or her sexual orientation.
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