A (L) v Min for Justice

• Jurisdiction: Ireland
• Judge: Mr. Justice Hogan
• Judgment Date: 21 December 2010
• Neutral Citation: [2010] IEHC 523
• Court: High Court
• Date: 21 December 2010

[2010] IEHC 523

THE HIGH COURT

[No. 1404 J.R./2010]

A (L) v Min for Justice

BETWEEN

L.A.

APPLICANT

AND

MINISTER FOR JUSTICE, EQUALITY AND LAW REFORM

RESPONDENT

1 1. The applicant in these proceedings seeks an interlocutory injunction restraining her deportation pending the outcome of her challenge to the validity of decisions of the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform refusing to grant her subsidiary protection under the European Communities (Eligibility for Protection) Regulations 2006, and making a deportation order against her. The decision to refuse subsidiary protection was received by the applicant on 29 ^th September, 2010, and the subsequent deportation order was received on 19 ^th October, 2010. These proceedings were commenced on 2 ^nd November, 2010, within the fourteen day period specified by s. 5 of the Illegal Immigrants (Trafficking) Act 2000. The Minister has, however, declined to give an undertaking not to deport her pending the determination of the application for leave to apply for judicial review.

2 2. The applicant is a Cameroonian national who arrived in Ireland in May, 2008 where she sought asylum. The essence of her claim was that her house was burned down as a result of riots arising from the political situation in Cameroon and that her husband and mother perished in the fire. She further claims that she was raped and beaten as a result of this civil unrest.

3 3. It is important to stress that her claims were examined by both the Refugee Applications Commission and the Refugee Appeals Tribunal who both rejected her claims. Specifically, in its decision of October, 2008 the Tribunal rejected the rape allegation, on the basis that her "inconsistent testimony in relation to central elements of her claim undermines the credibility of her account." It further noted that neither the applicant nor her late husband had even been engaged in political activity or that she had ever been arrested, detained or imprisoned by the authorities. The Tribunal concluded that while the applicant "may fear genuine indiscriminate violence in Cameroon, this does [not] amount to persecution for a Convention reason".

4 4. These findings have never been challenged in judicial review proceedings. While it is true that these adverse credibility findings cannot absolve the Minister from the necessity of making a separate assessment of the risk posed for the purposes of either the prohibition on refoulement in s. 5 of the Refugee Act 1996, or the Subsidiary Protection Regulations, absent new evidence, these are factors to which the Minister can properly have regard: see, e.g., Meadows v. Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform [2010] IESC 3.

5 5. Credibility is the central issue so far as the substantive case is concerned. There is little doubt but that the human rights record of the Cameroonian Government is poor and a report from Amnesty International for 2010 suggested that the authorities had done little to investigate the unlawful killings and other human rights abuses perpetrated by the security forces in the aftermath of the riots of February, 2008. Likewise, if there were credible reasons to believe that the applicant had been raped in the course of the conflict, then the applicant's case for subsidiary protection - quite independently of any refugee considerations - would be immeasurably strengthened. Such a violation of the person would clearly constitute "serious harm" within the meaning of Article 2(2)(c) of the Subsidiary Protection Regulations, since it would constitute a "serious and individual threat to a civilian's life or person by reason of indiscriminate violence in situations of international or internal armed conflict". The difficulty so far as the applicant is concerned is that the two independent administrative bodies which were entrusted with the task of adjudicating on these matters has found against her on credibility grounds. She has never challenged these findings in judicial review proceedings: the present case solely consists of a challenge to the Minister's determination of the subsidiary protection and the deportation issues. These issues are, however, for another day - I merely mention them to sketch in some of the background against which this application has been made.

6 6. So far as the present...