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Determination of the merits of a non-refoulement claim is a matter for the Director and the Board, not for the Court

High Court of The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region: A Bench comprising of Hon Yeung Ag CJHC, Hon Poon and Pang JJA., dismissed the appeal of the applicant as he was unable to discharge the burden upon him to prove the said inflicted harm upon him.

The applicant was an Indian national who sought entry to Hong Kong from Delhi on strength of his passport at the airport. While pending his removal to Delhi, he filed a non-refoulement claim on account of being harmed or likely to be killed by a said majority party in India as he refused to be a supporter of the same.

Further, his claim was rejected by the Director of Immigration on assessing the risk involved to be low as he reasoned it with the party person having ample opportunity to do so but what was claimed to may happen didn’t really had the weightage to allow the applicant his desired claim. Also, it was considered that the availability of state protection and the possibility of relocation would further lower or negate the perceived risk. The applicant had also failed to establish his non-refoulement claim under all applicable grounds.

Accordingly, after considering the facts, the Court was satisfied that the decisions of the Director and the Board were justified. Hence on account of no legal error and fairness in the process, the leave to apply for judicial review had been refused. The appeal was dismissed.[Maninder Singh, In re, [2018] HKCA 733, order dated 31-10-2018]

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