The High Court has refused M.Y.M. permission to pursue an appeal over an earlier decision rejecting his attempt to challenge a non-refoulement decision and deportation order.
Ms Justice Siobhán Phelan delivered the ruling on November 7, 2025, following her September decision refusing M.Y.M. leave to bring judicial review proceedings.
Because immigration cases of this type have a restricted appeal route, M.Y.M. first needed a High Court certificate confirming that his case involved a point of law of exceptional public importance which it was desirable in the public interest to have determined on appeal.
He proposed two questions. The first concerned whether section 5 of the Illegal Immigrants (Trafficking) Act 2000 applies to decisions under section 50 of the International Protection Act 2015, which deals with the prohibition on returning a person to a territory where specified serious risks exist.
The judge found no relevant legal uncertainty. She noted that M.Y.M. had himself argued at the original leave hearing that section 5 applied. She also relied on existing High Court and Supreme Court authority supporting that interpretation.
The second proposed question was whether the Minister must carry out a fresh assessment under Article 15(c) of the EU Qualification Directive when considering non-refoulement under section 50. Article 15(c) concerns serious threats arising from indiscriminate violence during armed conflict.
The court held that section 50 sets out a distinct and finite test at the end of the protection process. It does not require the Minister to reassess the entire international protection claim or repeat an Article 15(c) analysis already dealt with through the statutory protection process.
The judge found no conflicting authorities, practitioner uncertainty or unresolved legal issue on either point.
The certificate application was therefore refused. The earlier decision refusing leave for judicial review remains in place, and this ruling did not itself reconsider the merits of the underlying deportation or protection decisions.