The High Court has rejected a challenge by a stateless woman who sought asylum in Ireland after previously receiving refugee status in Italy.
S.Y., who was ethnically Eritrean but had lived in Sudan, was recognised as a refugee in Italy in July 2005. She arrived lawfully in Ireland in October 2006 and applied for asylum here.
She told immigration authorities that she had left Italy because economic and social conditions were difficult, she could not find work or suitable accommodation and she felt vulnerable while pregnant. She did not claim that she feared persecution in Italy.
The Refugee Applications Commissioner initially sought to return her claim to Italy under the Dublin Regulation, but that course was later abandoned. In June 2007, the Commissioner informed her that her Irish asylum application would not be processed because section 17(4) of the Refugee Act 1996 prevented the Minister from granting refugee status to someone already recognised as a refugee elsewhere who did not fear persecution in that country.
Mr Justice McMahon upheld that approach. He found there was no factual dispute about fear of persecution in Italy and held that a further interview or investigation would have been futile because the Minister had no discretion to grant the declaration sought.
The court also rejected S.Y.’s argument that she had a legitimate expectation that her Italian refugee status could be transferred to Ireland. The report she relied upon was not an official State representation and there was no evidence that she had travelled to Ireland in reliance on it.
A separate claim concerned her daughter, R.Y., who was born in Ireland on 4 January 2007. The court refused to declare the child an Irish citizen because the statutory nationality procedure had not first been used and the evidence did not establish that she was ineligible for citizenship of another country.
The judicial review relief sought by both applicants was therefore refused.